OUR  REVOLUTION 


ESSAYS     IN     INTERPRETATION 


BY 

VICTOR  S.  YARROS 


BOSTON 

RICHARD  G.  BADGER 

THE   GORHAM   PRESS 


COPYRIGHT,  1920,  BT  RICHARD  G.  BADGER 


All  Rights  Reserved 


Made  in  the  United  States  of  America 


The  Gorham  Press,  Boston,  U.  S.  A. 


4N  LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
SANTA  BARBARA 


Y3 


DEDICATED  WITH  GRATITUDE  TO 

R.  S.  Y.,  M.D., 

A   FAITHFUL   LIFE-LONG   COMRADE 
AND   COMPANION 


THE    ESSENCE    OF    INDEPENDENT   RADI- 
CALISM:   INTRODUCTION 

THERE  are  now  a  good  many  radicals  in  the  world 
who  are  not  "ists" — not  State  Socialists,  not  Com- 
munists, not  Anarchists,  not  Syndicalists,  not  Guild 
Socialists.  They  are  not  ashamed  to  call  them- 
selves Opportunists,  however,  though  that  does  not 
give  them  the  conventional  title  of  "ists."  They  are 
independent  radicals,  Mugwump  radicals.  No 
school  or  dogma  claims  them,  yet  they  are  in  the 
exact,  scientific  sense  of  the  term  radicals. 

What  is  radicalism,  in  point  of  fact?  Super- 
ficial and  confusing  definitions  one  finds  everywhere, 
but  few  persons  seem  to  know  what  the  touchstone  of 
radicalism  is.  Yet  there  is  a  touchstone.  He  is  a 
radical  who  believes  that  the  existing  social,  eco- 
nomic and  political  system  is  wrong  and  wrong  fun- 
damentally; that  the  so-called  Liberal  reforms  and 
palliatives  are  not  sufficient  to  set  it  right,  and  that 
profound,  far-reaching  changes  are  necessary,  de- 
sirable and  indeed  inevitable. 

It  follows,  then,  that  the  radical  favors  profound 
changes,  welcomes  them  so  far  as  they  are  already 
casting  their  shadows  before  them,  and  endeavors  to 

5 


6  OUR  REVOLUTION 

facilitate  their  arrival  by  interpreting  them  to  the 
thoughtful  elements  of  the  public  and  by  seeking  to 
convince  conservatives  and  moderate  Liberals  amen- 
able to  reason  that  it  is  idle  and  dangerous  to  re- 
sist the  stream  of  social  tendency. 

Now,  the  independent  radical  is  not  a  State  So- 
cialist because  he  distrusts  and  fears  the  State,  which 
is  in  its  essence  tyrannical  and  intolerant,  and  al- 
ways has  been,  and  must  be,  unprogressive  and  in- 
efficient. He  is  not  a  State  Socialist  because  he 
shares  most  of  the  ideas  concerning  the  State  which 
the  philosophical  Anarchists,  the  Guild  Socialists, 
the  Syndicalists,  the  Single-Taxers  and  other  pro- 
gressives have  long  entertained.  Glorification  of 
"the  State"  is  to  the  independent  radical  repugnant 
and  absurd. 

The  independent  radical  is  not,  however,  a  philo- 
sophical Anarchist  either,  because  that  form  of 
radicalism  is  Utopian  and  metaphysical,  arid  and 
antiJDarwinian.  That  the  State  may  be  abolished  at 
some  remote  day,  is  possible.  That  men  and  women 
may  learn  to  dispense  with  compulsion  in  their  eco- 
nomic and  political  relations,  as  they  have  learned 
to  dispense  with  compulsion  in  the  spheres  of  re- 
ligion and  aesthetics,  is  possible.  But  such  hopes 
and  aspirations  have  practically  no  relation  to  the 
pressing  problems  of  the  day.  The  independent 
radical  would  solve  these  problems  along  libertarian 
lines,  though  he  realizes  the  necessity — nay  the 


INTRODUCTION  7 

wisdom — of  making  substantial  concessions  to  what 
is  called  the  Socialistic  spirit  and  trend  of  the 
time.  The  independent  radical,  though  individualis- 
tic in  his  philosophy,  perceives  that  it  is  foolish, 
idle  and  reactionary  to  oppose — for  example — 
child  labor  laws,  shorter  workday  laws,  social 
insurance,  old-age  pensions,  insurance  against  un- 
employment, and  the  like.  He  sees  that  to  oppose 
such  ameliorative  measures  is  to  give  aid  and  com- 
fort to  toryism,  to  alienate  labor  and  its  middle- 
class  sympathizers,  and  to  retard  the  reform 
process.  He  realizes  that  so  long  as  the  State 
exists,  and  is  being  used  by  social  groups  with 
power-  enough  to  shape  and  influence  legislation,  it 
is  utterly  irrational  to  expect  that  labor  and  the 
humanitarians  will  be  induced,  this  side  of  the  mil- 
lennium, to  ignore  the  State  or  refrain  from  utiliz- 
ing its  machinery  and  authority.  In  short,  he 
knows  that  life  obeys  no  dogmatic  formula,  and 
that  progress  is  a  resultant  of  many  forces  and 
factors. 

The  independent  radical  is  not  a  Syndicalist,  be- 
cause Syndicalism  is  an  extremely  nebulous  affair, 
as  Prof.  Bertrand  Russel  has  pointed  out,  that  fails 
to  protect  the  interests  of  the  consumers,  of  the 
public,  or  to  provide  for  any  form  of  systematic  co- 
operation among  the  autonomous  syndicates  or  com- 
munes. The  Syndicalists  have  never  thought  out 
or  worked  out  their  vague  and  attractive  ideas. 


8  OUR  REVOLUTION 

They  have  served  a  most  useful  purpose  in  helping 
to  undermine  and  discredit  orthodox,  rigid,  bureau- 
cratic socialism.  They  have  made  a  profound  im- 
pression on  many  Socialist  writers  and  leaders,  even 
though  the  latter  would  stoutly  deny  this.  But 
negative  service  is  not  positive.  The  Syndicalists 
are  like  the  Communist  Anarchists — they  know  what 
they  do  not  want,  but  have  few  definite  and  con- 
structive ideas. 

The  Guild  Socialists  see  the  weaknesses  of  Syn- 
dicalism and  have  made  an  effort  to  escape  them 
in  their  own  scheme.  Bertrand  Russell,  in  particu- 
lar, has  given  us  an  attractive  enough  scheme  of 
modified  Guild  Socialism  in  his  "Proposed  Roads  to 
Freedom"  and  in  his  "Political  Ideals."  Still,  it 
cannot  be  pretended  that  Guild  Socialism  offers  a 
permanent  home  to  those  independent  radicals  who 
have  little  faith  in  paper  plans,  and  who  prefer  to 
apply  first  principles  to  problems  and  situations  as 
they  arise.  Why,  indeed,  commit  one's  self  to  a 
nebulous  scheme  that,  if  ever  realized  at  all,  will 
undoubtedly  undergo  a  hundred  further  modifica- 
tions? What  advantage  is  there  in  identifying  one's 
self  with  an  "ism"  that  one  does  not  expect  to  carry 
out,  or  even  adequately  try  on  a  small  scale?  It  is 
most  important  to  know  one's  goal  or  objective;  it 
is  important  to  have  criteria  and  tests;  it  is  im- 
portant to  know  whither  one  is  going,  where  to  stop 
if  it  be  necessary  to  retrace  one's  steps,  and  how  to 


INTRODUCTION  9 

get  back  to  the  true  line  of  march.  But  a  dogmatic, 
rigid  "ism"  is  a  hindrance,  not  a  help,  in  all  these 
respects. 

The  independent  radical  knows,  as  has  been  said, 
that  he  is  not  a  State-ist.  He  also  knows  that 
though  he  is  a  good,  practical  democrat,  he  has  no 
reverence  for  "the  masses,"  and  no  love  for  that 
abstraction,  "humanity."  He  wants  justice,  equal 
opportunity  and  equal  liberty.  He  hates  iniquitous 
special  privileges.  He  condemns  a  regime  that  is 
supposed  to  be  free  and  genuinely  competitive  and 
that  is  in  fact  full  of  monopoly  and  artificial,  law- 
supported  inequalities.  He  recognizes  that  justice 
needs  to  be  supplemented  with  what  Herbert  Spen- 
cer calls  negative  and  positive  beneficence,  but  he 
insists  that  justice  is  fundamental  and  primary. 

Translated  into  concrete,  specific  propositions,  the 
creed  of  the  independent  radical  may  be  summed  up 
thus  : 

Free  access  to  natural  opportunities,  with  occu- 
pancy and  use  as  the  only  title  to  land  in  the  broad 
sense  of  the  term. 

Free  banking  and  co-operative  credit,  with  a  fair 
and  stable  standard  of  value — preferably  the  Mul- 
tiple Standard. 

Free  trade  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  phrase. 

Voluntary  co-operation  in  industry  on  the  widest 
scale,  with  democracy  in  the  management  of  cor- 
porations and  firms  not  co-operative  in  character. 


10  OUR  REVOLUTION 

Service  at  cost  as  the  only  basis  for  public  utili- 
ties, with  but  a  moderate  return  to  the  capital  in- 
vested, and  with  Trustee  management. 

Proportional  representation,  the  referendum,  the 
initiative  and  the  recall. 

Second  or  revising  chambers,  where  advisable  at 
all,  constructed  on  the  lines  of  the  Rusian  soviet, 
with  safeguards  against  the  frauds  and  abuses  that 
have  so  far  characterized  the  so-called  Soviet  sys- 
tem. 

These  and  other  planks  of  the  platform  of  the 
growing  host  of  independent  radicals  are  expounded 
and  defended  in  the  several  essays  included  in  the 
present  volume.  Elaboration  here  would  involve 
repetition,  which  the  author  has  sought  to  avoid. 

All  the  papers  in  this  volume,  with  but  one  or  two 
exceptions,  have  appeared  in  one  or  another  of  the 
following  Reviews: 

The  American  Journal  of  Sociology. 

The  International  Journal  of  Ethics. 

The  Open  Court. 

The  Public. 

The  Nation. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

INTRODUCTION:  THE  ESSENCE  OF  INDEPENDENT  RADICALISM  .  5 

MAKING  READY  FOR  THE  NEW  DAT 15 

THE  COMING  INDUSTRIAL  DEMOCRACY 23 

SOCIALISM  AND  INDIVIDUALISM  IN  EVOLUTION 88 

WHAT  SHALL  WE  Do  WITH  THE  STATE? 51. 

HUMAN  PROGRESS:   THE  IDEA  AND  THE  REALITY       ...  91 

RECENT  ASSAULTS  ON  DEMOCRACY 115 

INCOME  AND  THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE 129 

How  DEMOCRACY  FUNCTIONS 156 

SHALLOW  ECONOMICS  FOR  THE  PEOPLE 166 

SOCIALISM  RECOGNIZING  ITS  MISTAKES 173 

A  NEGLECTED  OPPORTUNITY  AND  DUTY  IN  JOURNALISM.       .  179 

THE  RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA  .......  194 

TRUE  DEMOCRACY  AND  PROGRESS 214 

BOLSHEVISM:   ITS  RISE,  DECLINE,  AND  FALL 226 


11 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

ESSAYS  IN  INTERPRETATION 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

MAKING  READY  FOR  THE  NEW  DAY 

WHAT  do  enlightened  and  advanced  liberals  mean 
by  "social  reconstruction"  after  the  war?  What 
changes  would  they  order  if  power  were  placed  in 
their  hands?  In  Great  Britain,  as  we  know,  an 
extraordinary  programme  of  social  reconstruction 
has  been  put  forth  in  the  name  of  the  Labor  party. 
While  this  programme  is  said  to  have  been  prepared 
by  a  distinguished  middle-class  Fabian  leader,  it 
embodies,  without  doubt,  an  honest  and  in  the 
main  a  successful  attempt  to  voice  the  aspirations 
and  ideas  of  organized  labor  in  England,  Scotland, 
and  Wales.  We  know  also  that  hosts  of  British 
middle-class  liberals  and  radicals  accept  it  as  a  sort 
of  modern  democratic  Magna  Charta.  This  pro- 
gramme is  distinctly,  unmistakably  socialistic.  We 
may  like  it  or  dislike  it,  but  we  cannot  seriously 
pretend  to  entertain  any  doubt  regarding  its  na- 
ture, meaning,  and  informing  principle.  It  calls 
for  the  nationalization  of  railways,  mines,  shipping, 
and  electric-power  plants.  It  demands  the  gradual 
nationalization  of  land.  It  favors  the  strict  control 
and  regulation  of  all  important  industries  that  may 
be  left,  for  the  present,  in  private  hands.  It  de- 

15 


16  OUR  REVOLUTION 

mands  the  establishment  by  law  of  a  national  univer- 
sal minimum  standard  of  living  and,  necessarily,  of 
minimum  wage  schedules.  It  demands  such  drastic 
rates  of  income  and  inheritance  taxation  as  shall 
result  in  diverting  the  "national  surplus"  into  the 
national  treasury. 

Let  us  turn  to  the  United  States.  What  does 
"social  reconstruction"  mean  to  Americans  who  are 
not  orthodox  socialists  or  single  taxers?  President 
Wilson,  in  his  famous  letter  to  the  Democrats  of 
New  Jersey,  earnestly  bade  us  make  ready  for  the 
birth  of  a  new  day,  "a  day  of  greater  opportunity 
and  greater  prosperity  for  the  average  mass  of 
struggling  men  and  women."  What  is  the  bearing 
of  this  generality  on  our  land  problem,  our  foreign 
trade  and  tariff  problem,  our  banking  and  currency 
problem,  our  corporation  and  labor  problem?  Re- 
strictive laws,  national  and  State,  in  certain  direc- 
tions may  be  necessary  and  advisable.  Doctrinaire 
opposition  to  "over-legislation"  is  idle  and  perhaps 
even  unsound.  We  may,  without  treason  to  liberty, 
to  a  higher  individualism,  demand  and  support  laws 
against  child  labor  and  woman's  excessive  toil.  We 
may  favor  pension  and  insurance  legislation,  even 
minimum-wage  legislation.  These  things,  however, 
are  superficial.  They  will  not  bring  "greater  op- 
portunity and  greater  prosperity  to  the  mass  of 
struggling  men  and  women."  What  will?  What  are 
we  really  driving  at?  What,  to  repeat,  would  we 


propose  and  do  if  we,  advanced  liberals  and  non- 
Socialist  radicals;  we,  the  discontented  and  politic- 
ally unattached  or  half-attached;  we,  the  seekers 
of  new  and  more  genuine  alliances — what  would  we 
do  if  we  had  the  opportunity  and  the  power? 

To  us  the  British  labor  programme  of  reconstruc- 
tion comes  as  a  challenge  to  translate  into  concrete 
terms  the  vague  words  that  are  often  on  the  lips  as 
we  look  forward  to  the  end  of  the  war.  Modestly, 
then,  and  only  for  the  purpose  of  stimulating  dis- 
cussion, I  submit  the  following: 

1.  The  land   should  belong  to   those  who   culti- 
vate it.     Hence  land  monopoly  and  holding  of  land 
out  of  legitimate  economic  use  should  be  opposed 
and  prevented  in  every  suitable  way — by  high  taxa- 
tion of  uncultivated  land,  by  restricting,  if  neces- 
sary,   individual    ownership    of    land    to    a    certain 
acreage,  to  be  determined  by  local  conditions,  and 
by  encouraging  the  reclamation  and  improvement  of 
waste  land  by  settlers  through  co-operative  credit 
agencies    and    a   minimum    amount    of   Government 
aid  and  supervision. 

2.  Trade  and  commerce  should  be  free,  and  cus- 
toms barriers  levelled  down.     Protection  should  be 
gradually  but  steadily  abolished,  and  moderate  tariff 
duties  levied  for  revenue  only,  pending  a  thorough 
revision  of  our  whole  system  of  taxation. 

3.  Natural  resources  should  be  conserved  for  the 
benefit  of  the  people,  or  utilized  and  developed  for 


18  OUR  REVOLUTION 

the  benefit  of  the  whole  people  under  certain  regula- 
tions and  conditions — only  a  fair  return  to  invested 
capital  being  allowed  and  the  right  of  "recapture" 
being  properly  safeguarded. 

4.  Credit    should   be    further   democratized,    and 
facilities  for  issuing  circulating  notes,  on  the  one 
hand,  and  bonds  secured  by  land,  improvements,  or 
equipment  and  stocks  of  insured  goods,  on  the  other, 
should    be    further    extended    along    the    respective 
lines  of  the  Federal  Reserve  Act  and  the  Farm  Loan 
Act,  Government  aid  and  control  always  being  kept 
at    the    minimum    compatible,    at    any    given    time, 
with  the  maximum  of  efficiency  in  realizing  the  ends 
in  view — cheap  credit  and  low  rates  of  interest  on 
borrowed  capital. 

5.  In  justice  to  debtors  and  creditors  alike,  the 
multiple  standard  of  value,  as  advocated  by  scien- 
tific economists  and  approved  in  principle  by  prac- 
tical financiers,  should  be  substituted,  after  a  nec- 
essary   campaign    of    education,    for    the    metallic 
standard — now  gold — and  the  recurrent  evils  of  con- 
traction and  inflation  of  the  currency,  so  detrimental 
to  industry  and  labor,  should  thus  be  eliminated. 

6.  Direct  taxation  should  be  substituted  for  in- 
direct in  the  interest  of  economy  and  governmental 
responsibility,  and  the  principle  of  "ability  to  pay" 
explicitly  recognized  in  all  tax  and  revenue  legisla- 
tion. 

7.  The    working    masses,    skilled    and    unskilled, 


MAKING  REAiDY  FOR  THE  NEW  DAY     19 

should  be  thoroughly  organized,  collective  bargain- 
ing with  employers  instituted  and  pushed,  and  ade- 
quate machinery  for  the  arbitration  and  adjustment 
of  industrial  disputes  established — legislation  along 
the  lines  of  the  limited  Canadian  law  for  compul- 
sory investigation  and  temporary  postponement  of 
threatened  strikes  or  lockouts  to  be  part  of  such 
machinery,  for  the  most  part  voluntary. 

8.  The    capitalistic    or   wage    system    should    be 
gradually  and  consciously  replaced  by  co-operative 
control  and  management  of  industry  and  commerce. 
The  wage  system  is  incompatible  with  real  freedom 
and  dignity  of  labor  and  cannot,  at  the  best,  yield 
harmony  between  employers  and  employed.     With- 
out harmony  and  good  will,  efficiency  is  impossible. 
Hence,  co-operation  in  production,  distribution,  and 
exchange   should   be   encouraged   in   every   possible 
way,    profit-sharing   arrangements    being   employed 
to  pave  the  way  to  complete  co-operation.     Also, 
the  investment  by  workmen  and  clerks  in  the  securi- 
ties of  the  corporations  or  firms  employing  them 
should  be  encouraged  in  every  feasible  way,  and  rep- 
resentation should  be  given  on  directorates  to  the 
labor  force.     Employers  should  appreciate  the  wis- 
dom  and  necessity   of   "peopleizing"   industry   and 
giving  labor  a  direct,  substantial  stake  in  it. 

9.  There  should  be  representation  of  the  Govern- 
ment, or  of  the  people,  on  the  directorates  of  all 
public  utility  corporations,  with  full  publicity  for 


20  OUR  REVOLUTION 

all  their  operations,  supervision  of  their  financing, 
accounting,  and  bookkeeping,  and  other  applica- 
tions of  the  fundamental  principle  that  beneficiaries 
of  franchises  or  any  special  privileges  whatever  are 
subject  to  definite  public  control  because  the  public 
is  one  of  the  interests  vitally  concerned  in  the 
soundness,  honesty,  and  efficiency  of  such  corpora- 
tions. 

10.  Vocational  and  industrial  training,  in  addi- 
tion to  a  certain  minimum  of  general  or  liberal  edu- 
cation, should  be  provided  for  all  who  need  it. 

11.  There    should   be   drastic    simplification    and 
rationalization    of   legal    procedure,    elimination    of 
technicalities   and  fictions  therefrom,   and  the  free 
administration  of  justice  for  poor  litigants  or  claim- 
ants. 

12.  Proportional  representation  should  be  estab- 
lished in  every  legislative  assembly,  national,  State 
and  local. 

13.  Provision  should  be  made  for  the  employment 
of  the  referendum  and  initiative. 

14.  The  power  of  the  judiciary  to  annul  legisla- 
tion should  be  limited  so  as  to  render  four-to-three 
or  five-to-four  decisions  in  important  cases  impos- 
sible. 

A  perusal  of  the  foregoing  programme  will  show 
that  most  of  the  planks  are  economic  and  social 
and  only  a  few  political.  The  latter  are  mere  means 


MAKING  REAJ)Y  FOR  THE  NEW  DAY     21 

to  the  larger  ends  in  view.  The  paramount  object 
is  to  lessen  parasitism,  eradicate  monopoly  and 
anti-social  privilege,  and  insure  to  labor  a  just  re- 
turn, independence  and  dignity.  Certain  conces- 
sions, even  liberal  ones,  are  made  to  what  may  be 
called  paternalism.  The  dogmatic  and  metaphysi- 
cal individualists  of  an  earlier  time  would  have  re- 
garded such  concessions  as  fatal  and  treasonable, 
but  no  enlightened  champion  of  the  "new  freedom" 
is  likely  to  commit  the  error  of  solving  intensely 
practical  and  perplexing  problems  according  to  a 
precise  a  priori  formula.  If  government  is  com- 
promise, so  is  reform,  so  is  progress.  However, 
concessions  to  the  spirit  of  the  age,  to  situations 
and  conditions  that  will  change  very  slowly,  if  at 
all,  are  far  from  being  tantamount  to  surrendering 
the  main  position.  The  foregoing  programme  is 
essentially  individualistic.  It  is  based  on  the  idea 
that  opportunity  is  still  "the  other  name"  for 
America,  and  that  the  opening  up,  or  the  reopening, 
of  opportunities,  with  voluntary  co-operation  and 
healthy  initiative  in  a  fair  and  free  field,  would 
solve  our  problems  and  remedy  our  social  and  in- 
dustrial ills.  Legislation  and  political  action  will  be 
necessary,  but  much  will  have  to  be  done  by  em- 
ployers, labor,  and  the  neutral  elements  outside  of 
politics.  If  there  are  other  alternative  programmes 
that  yet  meet  the  test  of  President  Wilson's  chal- 


22  OUR  REVOLUTION 

lenge  or  summons,  let  them  be  produced  for  sympa- 
thetic examination  and  fruitful  discussion.  Only 
thus  can  we  fashion  a  programme  which  will  fit  the 
needs  of  to-morrow. 


THE  COMING  INDUSTRIAL  DEMOCRACY 

IN  a  paper  entitled  "Representation  and  Leader- 
ship in  Democracy,"  in  the  American  Journal  of  So- 
ciology, the  present  writer  incidentally  touched  upon 
the  momentous  question  of  industrial  democracy 
versus  industrial  autocracy  or  industrial  oligarchy. 
The  only  point  made  in  that  connection  was  this, 
that  certain  questions  that  are  often  treated  as 
purely  political — such,  for  example  as  the  question 
of  making  representative  government  truly  and  fully 
representative,  or  of  giving  the  masses  of  toilers 
the  weight  and  influence  in  government  to  which  their 
numbers  and  importance  entitle  them — are  really  at 
bottom  social  and  economic  questions,  since  a  de- 
graded, morally  corrupt,  and  ignorant  class  cannot 
be  expected  to  value  integrity,  intelligence,  and 
fidelity  in  elected  representatives  of  the  people,  or 
to  know  how  to  utilize  democratic  election  machinery 
to  their  actual  and  ultimate  benefit.  In  other  words, 
the  point  was  that  economic  and  social  injustice 
sooner  or  later  reduces  political  democracy  to  a  hol- 
low mockery  and  empty  form,  and  that  in  order  to 
eradicate  such  notorious  evils  as  corrupt  control  of 
legislation,  class  legislation,  insidious  bribery,  spoils 

23 


24  OUR  REVOLUTION 

politics,  and  waste  of  public  assets,  we  must  grad- 
ually remove  certain  kinds  of  economic  injustice. 

That  paper  brought  the  writer  a  spirited  letter  of 
admonition  and  comment  from  an  alert,  keen,  and 
thoughtful  employer  of  labor  who  is  not  an  apologist 
for  the  present  social  economic  order,  but  who  yet 
fears  that  vague  talk  about  industrial  democracy 
may  cause  more  harm  than  good.  The  letter  is 
doubtless  typical  and  symptomatic ;  many  employers 
who  would  energetically  protest  against  any  reflec- 
tion on  their  liberalism  and  progressivism  undoubt- 
edly share  the  sentiments  so  candidly  expressed 
therein.  So  do  many  influential  editors.  We  have 
permission  to  reproduce  the  letter  in  its  entirety, 
while  the  opportunity  of  considering  and  meeting 
the  points  it  raises  is  not  welcome. 

The  letter  is  as  follows : 

With  interest  I  have  read  your  article  on  "Repre- 
sentation and  Leadership  in  Democracies"  and  think 
that  you  have  stated  a  number  of  pertinent  truths 
well. 

I  am  a  manufacturer  and  take  exception  to  your 
statements  regarding  the  democratization  of  indus- 
try, not  that  this  is  not  desirable,  but  I  believe  you 
and  your  friends,  who  for  years  have  been  talking 
about  these  matters,  are  on  a  very  dangerous  sub- 
ject that  will  complicate  matters  very  seriously  in 
the  future. 

As  I  wrote  Dr.  Lyman  Abbott  years  ago,  if  you 
want  to  democratize  labor,  why  do  you  not  start 


THE  COMING  INDUSTRIAL  DEMOCRACY  25 

right  in  your  own  family,  making  the  cook,  treas- 
urer, and  the  butler,  secretary,  and  submit  all  ques- 
tions of  matters  pertaining  to  the  household  to  this 
council.  If  you  first  make  a  success  of  this,  no  doubt 
the  industries  will  follow. 

Success  in  business  is  at  all  times  dependent  on 
"eternal  vigilance."  You  have  to  buy  and  sell  at  the 
right  time  and  produce  your  material  of  the  right 
grade  and  at  the  right  price.  It  takes  practically  a 
genius  in  these  lines  to  be  a  successful  leader  and 
without  that  a  business  goes  to  smash. 

While  from  the  theoretical  point,  it  undoubtedly 
would  be  lovely  to  have  a  set  of  artisans  that  are 
clever,  industrious,  honest,  and  capable  of  giving 
counsel,  and  submit  the  whole  matter  to  them — of 
course  under  able  leadership  from  above — yet  under 
present  conditions,  the  results  would  not  be  any 
better  than  those  achieved  from  the  low-grade  wards, 
unless  you  could  pick  out  an  especially  efficient, 
sober,  and  industrious  class  of  workmen,  much  above 
the  average.  This,  of  course,  is  impossible  to  do  as 
a  general  rule,  as  you  must  employ  the  average  run 
of  laborers  offered. 

Talking  about  business  over-charging  and  so  on,  is, 
of  course,  not  altogether  nonsense,  but  the  business 
cannot  exist  on  a  margin  of  5  per  cent  profit.  Now, 
just  before  the  war,  we  built  a  new  plant  that  was 
intended  to  work  up  rock  imported  from  Germany. 
This  plant  was  hardly  in  good  working  order  before 
the  importations  were  stopped — fifteen  or  twenty 
thousand  dollars  thrown  into  the  gutter.  Next  we 
had  to  buy  mines  down  in  Georgia  and  start  pro- 
ducing material  there.  We  were  very  fortunate  in 


26  OUR  REVOLUTION 

getting  a  good  deposit,  but  now  the  ore  is  pinching 
and  from  all  indications,  we  will  have  to  move  all 
of  our  machinery,  etc.,  to  Tennessee  and  there  build 
railroads,  etc.,  to  handle  this  proposition.  As  far  as 
I  can  see,  we  will  have  to  make  an  investment  of 
about  seventy-five  thousand  dollars,  and  we  will  never 
know  the  quantity  or  quality  of  this  ore,  until  we 
are  through  working  it.  These  are  just  minor  things 
that  just  come  up,  and  come  up  every  day. 

Supposing  we  had  a  system  of  democratized  indus- 
try with  minimum  wages,  minimum  hours,  and  maxi- 
mum leisure,  and  we  at  the  same  time  had  to  com- 
pete, not  alone  in  the  home  market  with  other  manu- 
facturers, but  with  the  foreign  market — for,  of 
course,  we  have  to  have  free  trade,  fraternity,  and 
equality  the  world  around — and  the  Germans  with 
their  abundance  of  natural  raw  material  in  our  line 
and  expert  chemists  and  low  wages,  are  very  formi- 
dable competitors,  and  what  about  the  Japs  coming 
in  and  the  Chinese  with  a  daily  wage  of  ten  cents? 
I  think  the  difficulties  before  us  will  be  enough  as  it 
is  without  getting  us  into  a  fix  that  democratized  in- 
dustry would  unquestionably  lead  us  to. 

This  is  a  beautiful  thought,  but  if  this  dream  shall 
be  realized,  we  must  stop  the  emigration  of  all  but 
the  highest  grade  of  people  and  few  of  them.  We 
must  improve  our  home  stock,  doing  away  with  the 
large  increase  that  under  present  conditions  is  pro- 
duced by  our  low-grade  people. 

Now,  all  of  these  advices,  I  admit,  are  pretty  hard 
to  follow,  but  believe  me,  they  must  be  considered  be- 
fore you  can  introduce  "democratized  industry." 
While  it  may  be  a  very  good  catchword  on  the  plat- 


THE  COMING  INDUSTRIAL  DEMOCRACY  27 

forms  for  Progressive  leaders,  Socialists,  and  anar- 
chists— I  do  not  use  these  words  to  designate  low- 
grade  people,  but  the  theorists  and  individuals  who 
really  hope  to  improve  the  conditions  of  humanity — 
all  of  these  things  are  goals  that  we  may  try  to  reach 
in  some  distant  future,  but  they  are  not  within  the 
practical  reach  of  society  today. 

Kindly  excuse  my  writing  on  this  subject  to  you, 
but  the  fact  is  that  these  matters  are  of  very  great 
importance,  and  it  is  of  very  great  importance,  too, 
that  our  leaders  treat  them  seriously;  and  it  is  in 
the  hopes  of  gaining  a  new  convert  for  the  sane 
treatment  of  social  improvement  with  special  refer- 
ence to  democratized  industries,  that  I  am  writing 
you. 

Respectfully  yours, 

S.  H.  KREBS. 

P.S. — It  may  interest  you  to  know  that  I,  myself, 
thirty-five  years  ago  was  a  Scandinavian  emigrant, 
landing  on  these  shores  without  means  and  without 
any  pull  whatever,  managing  to  rise,  I  suppose,  to 
what  you  might  call  the  top  of  the  heap.  I  am  presi- 
dent and  principal  stockholder  of  the  Krebs  Pigment 
&  Chemical  Co. 

Before  attempting  to  answer  this  stimulating  com- 
munication, it  is  perhaps  not  impertinent  to  point 
out  that  some  employers  of  labor,  captains  of  indus- 
try, capitalists,  or  men  of  big  affairs — whatever  we 
may  call  them — have  latterly  spoken  or  written  in 
a  very  different  tone.  Mr.  Charles  M.  Schwab,  the 
head  of  the  greatest  steel  plant  in  the  world,  created 


28  OUR  REVOLUTION 

an  international  sensation  by  telling  a  school  alumni 
audience  that  a  new  social  order  is  coming ;  that  "this 
social  order  may  mean  great  hardship  to  those  who 
control  property  but,  perhaps,  in  the  end  it  will  work 
for  the  good  of  us  all."  "The  man  who  labors  with 
his  hands,  who  does  not  possess  property,"  continued 
Mr.  Schwab,  "is  the  one  who  is  going  to  dominate  the 
affairs  of  this  world."  And  he  concluded  with  the 
more  reassuring  reflection  that  the  transformation 
of  the  social  and  economic  order  "will  be  so  gradual 
that  we  will  hardly  realize  that  it  has  occurred." 

Now,  Mr.  Schwab  is  neither  a  sentimentalist  nor 
an  academic,  doctrinaire  radical.  He  does  not  wish 
to  give  away  his  wealth,  he  frankly  says,  nor  to  sur- 
render his  economic  power.  He  merely  perceives 
that  certain  changes  are  inevitable,  and,  indeed,  al- 
ready taking  place,  and  he  feels  that  it  is  his  duty, 
or  the  part  of  sagacity  and  common  sense,  at  any 
rate,  not  angrily  and  passionately  to  oppose,  but  to 
meet,  instruct,  and  discuss  matters  with  those  who 
are  more  radical,  or  less  fortunate,  or  less  rational 
than  himself. 

But  is  Mr.  Schwab  a  good  prophet?  Is  he  able 
to  see  things  as  they  are?  Well,  the  familiar  ten- 
dencies and  developments  of  our  day  would  seem  to 
answer  these  questions  beyond  peradventure.  Mr. 
Schwab  speaks  of  Socialism,  of  Russian  Bolshevism 
— which  is  merely  intransigeant  and  international 
socialism  temporarily  in  the  saddle — of  Syndicalism, 


THE  COMING  INDUSTRIAL  DEMOCRACY  29 

of  the  growing  influence  of  labor  unions  and  other 
radical  forces.  He  has  heard  of  the  Non-Partisan 
League.  He  knows  what  the  Labor  party  has 
achieved  in  England,  in  Australia,  in  New  Zealand, 
in  the  United  States  even,  where  it  is  not  as  yet  act- 
ing independently  in  national  or  state  politics,  but 
only  applying  pressure  to  the  great  historic  parties 
and  forcing  them  to  make  concessions  in  various  di- 
rections and  just  beginning  to  make  itself  felt  in 
municipal  politics. 

Can  any  sober-minded,  studious  observer  assert 
that  all  these  signs  and  portents  signify  little,  and 
that  the  practical,  hard-headed  man  of  affairs,  the 
"realist"  in  business  or  government,  may  calmly  ig- 
nore them  or  treat  them  as  of  no  consequence?  Can 
any  thoughtful  person  who  is  at  all  conversant  with 
political  and  industrial  history,  or  with  the  doctrine 
and  facts  of  evolution,  assert  that  the  existing  social 
order  is  immutable  and  attack-proof? 

Hardly.  Of  course,  the  shallow,  the  ignorant,  the 
intellectually  indolent  and  the  narrowly  selfish,  who 
think  only  of  the  present,  may  be  left  out  of  consid- 
eration. Profitable  argument  is  possible  only  with 
the  earnest,  the  open-minded,  the  intelligent  con- 
servatives and  beneficiaries  of  the  present  regime. 

Among  these,  no  doubt,  there  are  many  who  think 
that  the  present  order  is  sound  and  just  in  the  main, 
and  that  only  certain  so-called  progressive-conserva- 
tive reforms  are  either  desirable  or  possible.  Does 


30  OUR  REVOLUTION 

Mr.  Krebs  belong  to  this  category?  Is  he  of  the 
opinion  that  no  radical  reforms,  such  as  are  implied 
in  or  suggested  by  the  vague  phrase  "industrial 
democracy,"  are  necessary  or  practicable?  Is  he 
one  of  those  who  think  that  better  elementary  and 
vocational  training,  industrial  insurance,  a  shorter 
work-day,  and  like  measures  will  solve  the  social 
problem  and  do  away  with  the  dangers  that  beset 
us?  Does  he  think  that  benevolence  and  condescen- 
sion on  the  part  of  employers  will  satisfy  labor? 
Does  he  think  that  strikes,  friction,  bitterness,  class 
feeling,  and  the  terrific  economic  waste  that  attends 
these  phenomena,  can  be  abolished  by  a  few  pallia- 
tives? How  does  he  propose,  if  he  condemns  truly 
but  constructively  radical  reforms,  to  combat  the 
destructive,  extreme  notions  that  are  making  head- 
way everywhere?  Would  he  rely  on  force,  on  bayo- 
nets, martial  law,  and  the  machinery  of  coercion  and 
repression  generally?  Does  he  hold  that  might  can 
permanently  suppress  right? 

We  must  assume  that  he  believes  nothing  of  the 
sort,  and  that  the  real  question  with  him  is,  What 
is  right? 

Our  answer  is,  righteousness  and  justice  in  indus- 
try and  economic  relation  generally  now  mean  and 
enjoin,  and  will  gradually  bring  about,  "industrial 
democracy."  Our  answer  is,  there  is  no  use  in 
preaching,  crying,  or  thun3ering  industrial  peace 
where  there  is  no  peace. 


THE  COMING  INDUSTRIAL  DEMOCRACY  31 

And  why  is  there  no  peace?  Because  labor  feels 
that  it  is  still  largely  at  the  mercy  of  capital ;  that  it 
must  agitate,  threaten,  strike,  and  even  riot  to  obtain 
the  most  moderate  concessions;  that  it  does  not  ob- 
tain its  just  share  of  the  total  product  and  never  will 
obtain  it  under  industrial  autocracy ;  that  the  inter- 
ests of  the  employers  and  the  employed,  instead  of 
being  regarded  as  identical,  are  in  fact  diametrically 
opposed ;  that  it  is  no  more  reasonable  to  expect  eco- 
nomic justice  to  be  handed  down  from  above  than  it 
was  to  expect  political  justice  to  be  so  handed  down 
by  an  upper  class.  The  masses  are  now  politically 
enfranchised  and  have  a  voice  in  deciding  national 
and  international  affairs.  They  are  demanding  eco- 
nomic enfranchisement,  a  voice  in  the  management 
and  control  of  industry  and  trade.  If,  they  are 
asking,  production  is  impossible  without  labor,  why 
should  capital,  the  other  indispensable  human  factor, 
alone  control  industry? 

The  present  system  must  make  way — gradually, 
as  Mr.  Schwab  says,  but  make  way — for  a  coopera- 
tive system,  a  system  under  which  labor  is  a  partner 
in  industry,  shares  the  profits  of  industry,  has  a  voice 
in  determining  industrial  policies,  helps  decide  all 
questions  that  bear  on  wages,  hours,  working  condi- 
tions. Labor  is  often  unconscious  of  its  own  goal, 
but  cooperative,  democratic  control  of  industry  is 
undoubtedly  that  goal.  To  have  peace,  the  whole 
industrial  atmosphere  must  be  changed.  On  every 


32  OUR  REVOLUTION 

business  directorate  labor  should  have  representa- 
tion. The  rule  of  reason  and  equity  should  replace 
the  rule  of  brute  force  in  the  settlement  of  industrial 
questions.  Industry  must  be  "peopleized"  both  with 
respect  to  returns,  dividends  and  interest,  and  with 
respect  to  management. 

Is  this  too  Utopian  an  ideal?  Is  Mr.  Krebs  right 
in  warning  us  of  the  mischief  that  lurks  in  encourag- 
ing or  spreading  such  ideas?  The  ideal  is  not  Uto- 
pian. On  the  contrary,  it  is  intensely  practical. 
No  other  permanent  solution  of  the  social  problem 
is  discernible.  The  mischief  makers  are  those  who 
frown  upon  wholesome  discussion,  and  who  virtually 
tell  labor  that  it  must  always  remain  economically 
subject,  dependent,  enslaved. 

But  surely  industrial  democracy  is  a  most  difficult 
system  to  establish  and  operate.  Yes,  in  truth,  ter- 
ribly difficult.  It  will  require  decades,  perhaps  cen- 
turies, to  effect  the  complete  transformation.  Only 
the  ignorant  and  the  fanatical  Bolsheviki  imagine 
that  a  decree  or  two  by  a  group  of  socialist  dictators 
will  suffice  to  solve  the  social  problem.  The  extrem- 
ists are  responsible  for  much  friction  and  bad  tem- 
per, but  let  us  not  forget  that  there  are  extremists 
among  the  conservatives  as  well  as  among  the  radi- 
cals. 

The  sane,  the  reasonable  elements  in  society  should 
never  fail  to  recognize  the  obstacles  and  difficulties 
that  stand  in  the  way  of  industrial  democracy.  Mr. 


THE  COMING  INDUSTRIAL  DEMOCRACY  38 

Krebs  is  entirely  right  in  all  that  he  says  about  the 
part  played  by  constructive  ability,  organizing  ca- 
pacity, courage,  foresight,  insight,  patience,  in  mod- 
ern industry.  The  function  of  the  true  captain  of 
industry  is  of  great  and  growing  importance.  Such 
a  captain  needs  freedom  of  action  and  is  entitled  to 
ample  reward.  Any  cooperative  system  that  should 
fail  to  provide  for  freedom  and  adequate  reward  to 
the  real  managers,  the  directing  heads,  the  discover- 
ers of  new  opportunities,  the  originators  of  policies 
adapted  to  changing  conditions  would  speedily  col- 
lapse. Instead  of  creating  abundance,  such  a  sys- 
tem would  create  scarcity  and  uncertainty.  Work- 
ers who  have  not  learned  to  trust  leaders,  to  submit 
to  discipline,  to  make  democracy  safe  by  conferring 
necessary  power  and  responsibility  on  the  competent 
and  fit,  would  make  a  mess  of  any  democratized  in- 
dustry. But  how  are  the  workers  to  learn  self- 
restraint  and  discipline  under  autocratic  industry? 
They  will  learn  chiefly  by  doing,  by  practicing,  by 
trial  and  error.  Humanity  can  be  sent  to  no  other 
school  than  that  of  experience.  The  wise  men  are 
here  to  give  warning,  to  set  examples,  but,  after  all, 
we  get  our  education  by  living,  suffering,  enjoying, 
profiting  by  experience. 

It  is  our  duty  and  our  privilege  to  promote  indus- 
trial democracy  in  all  proper,  expedient  ways.  Trade 
unions  should  turn  their  thought  to  the  question  of 
cooperative  production  and  cooperative  distribution. 


34  OUR  REVOLUTION 

They  are  demanding  justice,  but  they  are  not  doing 
all  that  they  can  to  advance  and  establish  industrial 
justice.  They  think  too  much  of  immediate  questions 
and  not  enough  about  the  future  of  industry  and  la- 
bor. Why  should  not  American  trade  unions,  or  in- 
dustrial unions,  assume  entrepreneur  functions? 
Why  should  they  not  compete  with  private  contrac- 
tors ?  Why  should  they  not  start,  on  a  modest  scale, 
cooperative  factories?  One  such  factory,  if  success- 
ful, would  be  worth  a  thousand  strikes  from  the  point 
of  view  of  ultimate  economic  justice  and  order.  In 
primitive  Russia  there  are  thousands  of  Artiels,  co- 
operative organizations  of  peasants  and  laborers.  If 
American  labor  wants  democratic  industry,  it  should 
proceed  to  give  society  object  lessons  in  democratic 
or  cooperative  industry.  We  may  be  sure  that  be- 
fore long  it  will  do  this  instead  of  contenting  itself 
with  negative  methods.  In  the  Old  World  coopera- 
tion has  grown  steadily  and  has  been  successful  in 
many  ways. 

Employers  of  intelligence  and  right  feeling  can  and 
should  play  an  active  part  in  democratizing  industry. 
Profit-sharing  is  a  step  in  the  right  direction.  The 
sale  of  stock  on  the  installment  plan  to  employees, 
with  the  logical  corollary,  the  election  of  represen- 
tatives of  the  employees  as  directors,  is  another  and 
even  more  important  step.  The  creation  of  perma- 
nent arbitration  boards  to  settle  and  prevent  disputes 
is  another  step. 


THE  COMING  INDUSTRIAL  DEMOCRACY  35 

In  short,  if  we  realize  that  industrial  democracy 
is  inevitable  and  right,  we  shall  find  a  hundred  dif- 
ferent ways  of  facilitating  its  advent  and  making 
the  process  peaceful  and  evolutionary. 

Occasionally  some  financial  or  corporate  organ 
publishes  with  every  evidence  of  satisfaction  figures 
that  tend  to  prove  the  steady  and  even  rapid  growth 
of  small  "owners"  of  our  industrial  properties.  We 
are  told  that  not  small  groups  of  magnates,  but  tens 
of  thousands  of  small  investors  own  the  Pennsyl- 
/  vania  Railroad,  or  the  New  York  Central,  or  even  a 
great  industrial  property.  The  moral  usually  drawn 
is  that  legislators  and  executive  officials  should  be- 
ware, in  their  assaults  on  "plutocracy,"  of  injuring 
industrial  democracy.  There  is  some  sense  and  force 
in  such  admonitions.  But  if  industry  is  actually  be- 
coming "peopleized"  and  democratized  by  means  of 
investment  in  corporate  stocks  and  bonds,  and  if 
this  tendency  is  beneficial  and  deserving  of  every 
encouragement,  does  it  not  clearly  follow  that  the 
control  and  management  of  industry  should  be  de- 
mocratized also,  as  far  as  possible?  Are  the  millions 
of  small  investors  to  be  used  and  led,  or  driven,  by 
a  few  speculators  or  autocrats?  Are  the  small  in- 
vestors to  vote  blindly  for  "proxies"  and  ask  no 
questions  so  long  as  they  get  their  dividend  checks? 
And  what  if  the  dividends  are  "passed"?  What  can 
the  small,  scattered,  unorganized  investors  and  bond- 
holders do  to  protect  their  interests,  to  prevent  fren- 


36  OUR  REVOLUTION 

zied  finance,  gambling,  waste,  and  spoliation?  Re- 
strictive legislation  alone  will  not  give  them  adequate 
protection.  Publicity,  democratic  control,  director- 
ates of  a  new  type,  will  be  found  increasingly  neces- 
sary to  this  end.  The  very  persons  who  decry  foolish 
and  demagogical  legislation  that  hampers  enterprise 
often  make  such  legislation  inevitable  by  opposing 
publicity  and  democratic  control  of  industry!  If 
small  investors  cannot  protect  themselves,  the  state 
will  have  to  protect  them,  and  state  protection  may 
or  may  not  be  intelligent.  The  "let  alone"  policy 
has  become  impossible.  If  we  are  to  have  neither 
autocracy  nor  anarchy  in  industry;  if  we  are  to  es- 
cape reactionary  bourbonism  and  hate-inspired,  wild 
Bolshevism  alike,  we  must  find  a  golden  mean,  and  we 
can  find  it  in  industrial  democracy. 

To  repeat,  the  difficulties  and  obstacles  in  the  way 
are  innumerable  and  enormous.1  But  what  great 
change  in  history  was  easy?  The  obstacles  will  have 

*Mr.  Krebs'  reference  to  democratization  of  the  kitchen  and 
servants'  quarters  is  not  very  happy.  Domestic  service  presents 
serious  problems,  but  they  are  different  from  those  under  dis- 
cussion. The  taint  of  servitude,  of  personal  or  social  inferior- 
ity, is  what  renders  domestic  service  so  deservedly  unpopular. 
The  first  step  toward  the  solution  of  the  "servant  problem"  is 
to  elevate  the  servant  to  the  rank  of  an  independent  wage- 
earner.  The  wage-worker  is  not  a  "servant,"  even  if  the  law 
still  calls  him  that;  he  is  the  equal  of  his  employer.  He  is 
backed  by  powerful  unions;  he  has  learned  to  insist  on  collec- 
tive bargaining;  he  enters  into  agreements  with  employers  and 
even  compels  the  latter  to  submit  to  arbitration.  None  of  these 
things  can  be  predicated  of  the  domestic  servant.  It  is  mere 
common  sense,  then,  to  try  industrial  democracy  where  the  con- 
ditions are  most,  not  least,  favorable,  where  the  parties  meet 


THE  COMING  INDUSTRIAL  DEMOCRACY  37 

to  be  surmounted,  the  knots  unraveled,  the  difficulties 
removed,  one  by  one.  There  is  no  choice  but  to  peg 
away,  to  labor  and  try,  to  summon  all  our  tolerance 
and  sympathy  to  the  task. 

on  a  plane  of  equality  and  already  have  "done  business"  with 
each  other  in  a  dignified,  manly  fashion.  The  kitchen  will  be 
the  last,  not  the  first,  to  be  democratized,  and  that  fact  is  in 
no  sense  an  argument  against  the  practicability  of  cooperation 
as  a  substitute  for  industrial  autocracy. 


SOCIALISM  AND  INDIVIDUALISM  IN 
EVOLUTION 

IN  the  rise,  decline  and  fall,  or  radical  modifica- 
tion, of  systems  of  thought  we  no  longer  find  any- 
thing astonishing.  In  a  world  of  change  thought 
naturally  evolves  along  with  everything  else.  But, 
while  general  statements  of  this  sort  command  uni- 
versal concurrence,  few  are  in  truth  prepared  for 
certain  concrete  exemplifications  of  the  doctrine  ex- 
pressed in  them.  The  average  person  cannot  read- 
ily believe,  for  instance,  that  the  Socialism  of  today 
is  a  very  different  thing  from  the  Socialism  of  1890, 
or  1900,  or  even  1910.  He  is  apt  to  assume  that  So- 
cialism is  a  fixed,  stereotyped  body  of  ideas  and 
propositions,  and  that  it  cannot  undergo  any  ma- 
terial change  without  ceasing  to  be  Socialism.  Simi- 
larly, the  average  person  thinks  Individualism  is 
what  it  was  in  the  days  of  Bright,  Cobden,  Manches- 
terism,  or,  at  any  rate,  of  Herbert  Spencer  and  the 
British  Liberty  and  Property  Defence  Leajgue.  As- 
sure him  that  Socialism  and  Individualism  have  both 
"marched,"  evolved,  taken  on  protective  coloring  and 
adapted  themselves  to  the  requirements  of  the  new 
era,  and  he  will  either  venture  to  doubt  the  af- 

38 


SOCIALISM  AND  INDIVIDUALISM       39 

firmation  or  else  conclude  inwardly  that  the  alleged 
changes  are  apparent  rather  than  real,  shadowy 
and  negligible  rather  than  substantial. 

Even  the  serious  reader  and  student  occasionally 
pauses  to  wonder  at  the  nature  and  quality  of  the  dif- 
ferences that  he  finds  between  the  Socialism  or  the 
Indivualism  of  today  and  the  same  schools  or  bodies 
of  doctrine  as  he  knew  them  a  quarter  of  a  century 
ago. 

The  Socialism  of  Edward  Bellamy,  of  Laurence 
Gronlund,  of  Hyndman,  of  Bebel  and  other  followers 
of  Marx  and  Engels  was  distinctly  rigid,  mechanical, 
artificial.  When  a  William  Morris  insisted  on  a  cer- 
tain elasticity  in  the  arrangements  of  the  Socialistic 
order,  he  was  dubbed  a  dreamer  and  Utopian.  The 
radical  who  could  not  swallow  the  orthodox  Socialist 
creed  was  usually  driven  to  become  an  Anarchist- 
Communist  of  the  Bakounin  or  Kropotkin  type. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Individualist  of  that  period 
never  thought  of  compromising  with  Socialism.  He 
condemned  the  whole  Socialist  movement  as  reaction- 
ary, non-evolutional,  unscientific  and  dangerous. 

What  is  the  situation  today  as  between  Socialism 
and  Individualism?  And  what  is  the  situation  in 
each  of  these  camps? 

Let  us  consider  a  few  symptomatic  develop- 
ments. 

A  few  months  ago  there  appeared  in  an  English 
translation  a  little  book  entitled  "Socialism  versus 


40 

the  State."  It  was  written  before  the  world  war,  but 
the  activities  of  the  "state" — of  the  governments — 
during  the  war  only  served  to  confirm  the  author's 
conclusions.  Yet  he  is  a  leading  European  socialist, 
Mr.  Emile  Vandervelde,  a  Belgian  writer  of  note  and 
now  a  minister  of  state. 

The  thesis  of  the  book  is,  in  substance,  that  Social- 
ism should  not  be  confused  with  Statism;  that  the 
extension  of  the  power  and  sphere  of  the  State,  as 
exemplified  by  the  nationalization  of  railroads  and 
other  utilities,  or  by  the  creation  of  government 
monopolies,  is  detrimental,  not  beneficial,  reaction- 
ary, not  progressive,  unless  it  is  accompanied  by  cor- 
responding changes  in  the  political  organization  of 
the  State  and  in  the  social  organization  of  the  in- 
dustries taken  over  and  "statitized." 

Mr.  Vandervelde  maintains  that  Socialism  is  the 
opposite  of  Statism.  The  latter,  he  says,  is  founded 
on  authority,  on  the  government  of  men  by  men, 
on  force  and  tyranny.  Statism  is  inseparable  from 
autocracy  and  bureaucracy,  and  never  can  be  demo- 
cratic. There  is  no  such  thing  as  a  free  State.  The 
State's  authority  must  be  restricted,  not  enlarged, 
and  in  the  future  the  State  will  disappear  entirely. 
Socialism  will  gradually  undermine  the  State  and 
make  it  unnecessary  and  undesirable.  Socialism  is 
"founded  on  the  management,  the  administration  of 
things,"  and  is  essentially  "the  organization  of  social 


SOCIALISM  AND  INDIVIDUALISM      41 

labor  by  the  workers,  grouped  in  public  associa- 
tions." 

Now,  all  these  phrases  have  a  Syndicalist,  rather 
than  a  Socialistic,  sound,  but,  whatever  the  Socialist 
casuists  may  say,  the  fact  is  that  contemporary  So- 
cialism has  been  profoundly  influenced  by  Syndicalist 
criticism  and  thought  and  has  been  compelled  to  bor- 
row rather  generously  from  the  stock  of  Syndicalist 
ideas.  But  let  us  pass  over  this  particular  phenome- 
non, interesting  and  piquant  as  it  is.  Let  us  ask  how 
Vandervelde  proposes  to  safeguard  what  he  calls  So- 
cialism and  keep  it  democratic,  free,  vital. 

It  cannot  be  said  that  his  answer  is  clear,  candid 
or  satisfactory.  He  repeatedly  draws  a  distinction 
between  the  democratic  State  and  the  Socialist 
regime  or  system.  He  tells  us  that  there  are  various 
ways  and  means  of  separating  the  State  as  the  or- 
gan of  authority,  the  embodiment  of  force,  from  the 
State  as  the  organ  of  management  or  administration. 
The  democratic  State  can  give  a  certain  degree  of 
autonomy  to  a  department  or  bureau  that  operates  a 
public  utility.  Or  it  is  possible  to  create  a  public 
corporation  "not  for  profit,"  appoint  trustees  to 
manage  it  in  the  interest  of  the  whole  community,  and 
give  them  sufficient  power  to  manage  the  corporation 
on  sound  business  principles,  rather  than  as  an  ad- 
junct of  the  central  governmental  machine.  Such  a 
corporation  would  bave  no  "police  power"  and  its 


42  OUR  REVOLUTION 

trustees  would  be  likely  to  retain  the  methods  of  pri- 
vate industry. 

This  is  true  and  important — to  a  democratic 
State  or  municipality  that  wishes  to  get  rid  of  an 
anti-social  monopoly  without  exposing  itself  to  the 
evils  of  an  anti-social  bureaucracy.  But  what  has 
it  to  do  with  Socialism?  Would  a  Socialistic  regime 
create  such  quasi-independent  corporations  and  per- 
mit them  to  borrow  their  methods  from  private  in- 
dustry? If  not,  then  we  are  entitled  to  know  from 
the  reformed  Socialist  school  what  methods  they  pro- 
pose and  what  manner  and  form  of  industrial  organi- 
zation they  favor. 

Mr.  Vandervelde,  "further  answering,"  points  out, 
however,  that  today  the  State  is  the  instrument  of 
the  ruling  classes;  that  the  conquest  of  political 
power  by  the  proletariat  is  to  be  followed  by  "the 
transformation  of  society  into  a  great  economic  co- 
operative by  the  socialization  of  the  means  of  pro- 
duction," and,  hence,  that  the  fusion  of  now  hostile 
classes  into  one  class  will  make  disinterested  public 
service  possible  for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of 
civilization. 

So  far  so  good.  A  militant,  enlightened  pro- 
letariat will  first  conquer  political  power,  socialize 
capital  and  industry,  pension  off  or  otherwise  dis- 
pose of  the  private  capitalists  and  proprietors,  and 
abolish  all  class  distinctions.  The  land,  factories, 
warehouses,  shops,  transportation  systems,  etc.,  will 


"SOCIALISM  AND  INDIVIDUALISM      43 

be  declared  the  common  property  of  the  community. 
Then — what?  How  will  this  railroad,  this  factory, 
this  bank,  that  great  store,  be  managed  and  oper- 
ated ?  By  bureaucrats  ?  By  men  appointed  by  some 
minister  or  president?  No,  explains  Vandervelde. 
The  French  Parti  Owarier,  he  tells  us  with  satisfac- 
tion, has  adopted  this  article : 

Operation  of  state  factories  to  be  entrusted  to  the 
laborers  who  work  in  them. 

"Can  anything  be  more  democratic  and  less  stat- 
ist?" asks  M.  Vandervelde.  No  elections  by  out- 
siders ;  no  appointments  by  bureaucrats ;  the  workers 
of  each  factory  will  form  a  council,  elect  directors 
and  managers,  adopt  rules  and  regulations,  and  then 
go  to  work  under  these  rules  and  regulations.  Per- 
haps the  regulations  will  be  unwise  at  first,  but  the 
opportunity  to  change  and  correct  them  will  always 
be  present.  At  any  rate,  the  workers  will  know  that 
they  themselves  are  the  court  of  ultimate  appeal,  and 
that  the  managers  are  their  agents  and  representa- 
tives, not  their  masters. 

It  must  be  admitted  at  once  that  this  picture  of  a 
democratized  factory  is  strikingly  different  from  the 
picture  usually  painted  by  the  critics  of  Socialism. 
The  alleged  vicious  element  of  Statism,  of  bureau- 
cracy, is  certainly  eliminated. 

Unfortunately,  neither  Vandervelde  nor  any  other 
of  the  neo-Socialists — if  one  may  call  them  by  that 
name — has  yet  cared  to  put  and  answer  the  following 


44  OUR  REVOLUTION 

question  (which  cannot  have  wholly  escaped  them) : 
"What  is  to  be  the  relation  of  the  autonomous 
group  of  workers  in  the  democratized  factory  to  the 
rest  of  the  community — to  other  workers,  engaged 
in  producing  other  goods,  and  to  farmers,  to  mer- 
chants and  to  the  professional  elements?  Are  the 
various  groups  of  workers  to  be  free  to  follow  their 
own  judgment,  to  fix  prices,  hours  of  labor,  and  so 
on,  as  they  may  see  fit,  or  are  they  to  be  controlled 
in  a  measure  by  some  other  body — perhaps  a  legis- 
lature elected  by  the  whole  community,  or  a  central 
Soviet?" 

Mr.  Bertrand  Russell,  a  social  radical  who  leans 
toward  what  he,  with  others,  calls  Guild  Socialism, 
or  a  modified  Syndicalism,  but  who  has  vigorously 
and  straightforwardly  criticised  all  orthodox  forms 
of  Socialism,  stresses  this  important  point  in  his  re- 
cent writings.  He  is  right,  of  course,  in  asserting 
that  complete  autonomy  or  independence  of  groups 
of  workers  spells  Anarchism,  or  Syndicalism,  not  So- 
cialism in  any  familiar  sense.  The  Socialist  must  em- 
phasize and  provide  for  the  interests  and  needs  of  the 
society  as  a  whole,  as  well  as  for  the  rights  and 
liberties  of  the  various  social  groups.  It  is  highly 
probable  that  the  neo-Socialists,  when  they  face  the 
difficulty  candidly,  will  adopt  the  solution  of  the 
Guild  Socialists,  which  is  thus  roughly  indicated 
by  Mr.  Russell  in  his  stimulating  and  timely,  though 


SOCIALISM  AND  INDIVIDUALISM       45 

not  in  the  least  original,  little  book  on  "Proposed 
Roads  to  Freedom": 

Every  industry  will  be  self-governing  as  regards 
all  its  internal  affairs,  and  even  separate  factories 
will  decide  for  themselves  all  questions  that  only  con- 
cern those  who  work  in  them.  .  .  .  Relations  be- 
tween different  groups  of  producers  will  be  settled 
by  the  Guild  Congress,  matters  concerning  the  com- 
munity as  the  inhabitants  of  a  certain  area  will  con- 
tinue to  be  decided  by  parliament,  while  all  disputes 
between  parliament  and  the  Guild  Congress  will  be 
decided  by  a  body  composed  of  representatives  of 
both  in  equal  numbers. 

Add  to  this  machinery — as  American,  Swiss,  Aus- 
tralian and  Canadian  Socialists  undoubtedly  would 
add — some  provisions  for  the  referendum  and  the 
initiative,  and  we  have  a  fairly  democratic  and  flex- 
ible scheme  of  administration.  We  have  a  scheme 
that  an  orthodox  Marxian  Socialist  would  hardly 
recognize  as  the  object  of  his  contemplation  and 
planning.  We  are  far  indeed  from  the  Dictatorship 
of  the  Proletariat,  from  Economic  Materialism,  from 
the  characteristic  sneers  at  "bourgeois"  solicitude  for 
minority  and  individual  rights!  We  are  almost 
equally  far  from  Fabian  glorification  of  Efficiency, 
of  the  government  of  experts,  of  the  scientifically 
organized  State.  The  individual  has  come  into  his 
own  once  more.  The  principle  of  personal  liberty,  of 


46  OUR  REVOLUTION 

spontaneity  or  voluntarism,  so  long  derided  and 
scorned,  is  again  acknowledged  as  paramount.  Few 
Socialists,  one  fancies,  would  today  take  exception 
to  the  following  dicta  of  Bertrand  Russell: 

The  glorification  of  the  State,  and  the  doctrine 
that  it  is  the  duty  of  every  one  to  serve  the  State,  are 
radically  against  progress  and  against  liberty.  The 
State,  though  at  present  a  source  of  much  evil,  is 
also  a  means  to  certain  good  things,  and  will  be 
needed  so  long  as  violent  and  destructive  impulses 
remain  common.  But  it  is  merely  a  means,  and  a 
means  which  needs  to  be  very  carefully  and  sparingly 
used  if  it  is  not  to  do  more  harm  than  good.  It  is 
not  the  State,  but  the  community,  the  world-wide 
community,  of  all  human  beings  present  and  future, 
that  we  ought  to  serve.  And  a  good  community 
does  not  spring  from  the  glory  of  the  State,  but  the 
unfettered  development  of  individuals.  ...  It  is  the 
individual  in  whom  all  that  is  good  must  be  realized, 
and  the  growth  of  the  individual  must  be  the  su- 
preme end  of  a  political  system  which  is  to  re-fashion 
the  world. 

The  same  idea  is  expressed  by  G.  D.  H.  Cole, 
an  able  and  progressive  English  writer  on  labor  and 
social  topics,  when  he  says  in  his  "Self -Government 
in  Industry": 

What  ...  is  the  fundamental  evil  in  our  modern 
society  which  we  should  set  out  to  abolish  ? 

There  are  two  possible  answers  to  that  question, 
and  I  am  sure  that  very  many  well-meaning  people 


SOCIALISM  AND  INDIVIDUALISM       47 

would  make  the  wrong  one.     They  would  answer, 
Poverty,  when  they  ought  to  answer,  Slavery.   .   .  . 

Poverty  is  the  symptom ;  slavery  the  disease.  The 
extremes  of  riches  and  destitution  follow  inevitably 
upon  the  extremes  of  license  and  bondage.  The  many 
are  not  enslaved  because  they  are  poor ;  they  are  poor 
because  they  are  enslaved. 

Now,  it  is  unquestionably  true  that  at  no  time  in 
human  history  were  these  truths  or  principles  wholly 
obscured  and  forgotten.  The  significant  fact  to  bear 
in  mind  is  that  the  schools  of  thought  and  reform 
that  have  been  disposed  to  emphasize  material  and 
economic  considerations  are  today  desirous  and  even 
anxious  to  disavow  indifference  to  the  demand  for  the 
unfettered  development  of  individuals  and  for  such 
appropriate  social  machinery  and  forms  of  organi- 
zation, political  and  industrial,  as  shall — to  use  Mr. 
Russell's  words — "reduce  to  the  lowest  possible  point 
the  interference  of  one  man  with  the  life  of  an- 
other." 

It  is  sometimes  said,  half-f  acetiously  or  half -para- 
doxically, that  "we  are  all  Socialists  now."  Certain- 
ly the  rigid,  dogmatic  opposition  to  what  is  called 
restrictive  and  regulative  social  legislation  that  was 
characteristic  of  Individualist  and  Philosophical 
Anarchists  two  decades  ago  is  hardly  ever  met  with 
in  reform  circles  and  reform  periodicals.  But  it  is 
almost  equally  true  that  "we  are  all  Individualists 
now,"  in  the  sense  that  few  of  the  Socialists  and  Com- 


48  OUR  REVOLUTION 

munists  rail  at  Individualism  or  profess  much  confi- 
dence in  or  affection  for  the  Socialist  State. 

The  change  that  has  taken  place  in  radical  thought 
is  primarily  ethical  and  secondarily  political.    Cer- 
tain systems  of  philosophy  have  suffered  shipwreck. 
Ideas  and  formulas  that  were  unpopular  for  a  long 
time  have  regained  their  former  hold  and  appeal. 
We  no  longer  worship  the  State  or  the  Majority.  We 
are  good  practical  democrats,  but  we  treat  demo- 
cratic forms  of  organization  as  wise  compromises. 
The  most  valuable  thing,  we  realize  once  more,  is 
personality,    and    personality    abhors    bureaucratic 
routine,     strait  jackets,     artificial     and     mechanical 
arrangements.    We  cannot  dispense  with  machinery, 
but  we  must  not  make  a  fetich  of  machinery.     The 
essential  object  in  all  our  contrivances  is  to  free, 
elevate  and  ennoble  the  individual.    We  are  advocat- 
ing cooperation  in  a  hundred  directions,  but  we  want 
the  cooperation  to  be  voluntary,  at  least  as  far  as 
possible.     We  are  transforming  our  industrial  sys- 
tem— slowly,  perhaps,  but  steadily  and  surely — not 
so  much  because  it  produces  a  "submerged  tenth," 
not  because  it  does  not  afford  a  living  wage  to  all,  but 
because  it  has  killed  joy  in  work,  has  deprived  even 
the  well-paid  mechanic  of  a  stake  and  voice  in  the 
industry  that  monopolizes  his  energy  and  time,  and 
because  it  has  destroyed  the  freedom,  dignity  and  in- 
dependence of  the  working  masses.     We  are  democ- 
ratizing our  industries  in  various  ways,  but  the  aim 


SOCIALISM  AND  INDIVIDUALISM       49 

is  the  same — the  emancipation  of  the  laborer.  De- 
mocracy in  industry  means  that  the  employe  is  his 
own  employer  or  master — that  he  works  for  himself 
and  obeys  rules  which  he  has  himself  helped  to  frame 
and  adopt,  after  the  manner  of  the  members  of  a 
social  or  scientific  club  that  makes  rules  without  en- 
slaving the  membership. 

We  are  transforming  our  political  organization 
because  the  individual  has  become  too  insignificant 
and  because  so-called  representative  government  has 
largely  broken  down.  The  referendum,  the  initiative, 
the  recall,  proportional  representation,  Industrial 
Councils — "British  style" — to  advise  and  guide  Par- 
liament, or  the  political  council — all  these  things  are 
designed  to  increase  the  importance  and  the  power 
of  the  individual  under  modern  conditions.  The  in- 
dividual will  insist  on  justice  and  freedom,  for  with- 
out these  he  cannot  have  self-respect  and  manliness. 
He  will  have  economic  justice,  not  because  he  has 
any  "materialist  interpretation  of  history,"  but  be- 
cause a  sense  of  wrong,  injustice,  undeserved  in- 
equality, subjection  and  exploitation  is  intolerable  to 
a  free  man.  He  will  have  political  justice  for  the 
same  reason.  Under  a  just  and  fair  system  the  in- 
dividual will  be  eager  to  work  with  other  individuals 
for  the  common  good.  Under  a  just  system  he  will 
even  surrender  a  certain  amount  of  freedom  of  ac- 
tion, because  give-and-take,  compromise,  provided  it 
is  open,  honest,  based  on  antecedent  general  consent, 


50  OUR  REVOLUTION 

is  indispensable  in  any  civilized  society.  But  the 
basic  condition  of  voluntary  cooperation  and  mutual 
concessions  is  justice. 

May  we  not,  then,  be  witnessing  a  remarkable  rap- 
prochement between  Socialists  and  Individualists? 
Is  not  a  common  ground  being  prepared  by  the  latest 
formulators  of  social  creeds?  The  Socialists  have 
in  the  past  emphasized  cooperation,  the  Individualists 
— freedom.  The  Socialists  were  betrayed  into  dog- 
matism, into  worship  of  the  State,  into  blind  trust 
in  mere  machinery,  organization,  external  changes. 
The  Individualists  were  betrayed  into  a  narrow  sec- 
tarian, holier-than-thou  attitude  toward  the  State, 
into  professed  abhorrence  of  all  "compulsion,"  into 
blind  worship  of  competition,  of  personal  liberty. 
Today  the  scales  have  fallen,  or  are  falling,  from 
the  eyes  of  Socialists  and  Individualists  alike.  Both 
schools  have  learned  something  in  the  last  decade, 
and  especially  in  the  last  quinquennium.  No  one  who 
thinks  wishes  to  sacrifice  the  individual,  the  human 
spirit,  to  the  Moloch  of  efficiency,  or  to  the  State,  or 
to  organization.  On  the  other  hand,  the  necessity 
and  utility  of  cooperation  is  universally  recognized. 
There  is  at  last,  after  a  century  of  polemics  and 
conflicts,  an  opportunity  for  a  radical  entente.  The 
march  of  thought  leads  to  differentiation,  but  it  also 
leads  to  unity,  to  synthesis.  Are  we  approaching 
unity  in  social  thought  and  reformatory  activity? 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  THE  STATE? 

ONE  of  the  remarkable  effects  of  the  Great  War 
has  been  the  revival  of  the  long-suspended  campaign 
against  "the  state."  Sentiments  that  remind  one 
strongly  of  eighteenth-  and  nineteenth-century  po- 
litical thought  have  been  rather  freely  expressed  of 
late.  Individualism  and  philosophical  anarchism 
may  well  claim  substantial  victories  and  signifi- 
cant conversions.  "The  state — that  is  the  enemy," 
the  radical  individualists  said  and  wrote  in  the 
eighties  and  nineties  of  the  last  century.  Among 
their  authorities — in  a  scientific  sense,  of  course — 
were  British,  French  and  even  Teutonic  thinkers 
who  had  deplored  the  steady  extension  of  the  state's 
functions  and  the  growth  of  "paternalism"  and 
"compulsion"  at  the  expense  of  the  individual  citi- 
zen or  the  dissenting  group.  Laissez  faire  was  the 
popular  liberal  doctrine  in  those  days,  and  while  it 
was  admitted  that  the  existing  social-economic  order 
was  by  no  means  perfect,  and  that  much  injustice 
and  special  privilege  existed  which  demanded  the  at- 
tention of  sincere  and  progressive  men,  the  remedy 
for  all  the  social  ills  was  declared  to  be  "more 

51 


52  OUR  REVOLUTION 

liberty,"  more  competition,  and  less  governmental 
intermeddling  with  "natural"  human  activities. 

A  few  years  ago  these  phrases  would  have  sounded 
very  strangely,  had  any  prominent  thinker  cared  to 
use  them.  They  would  have  been  received  with 
amusement  and  astonishment,  as  something  ancient, 
irrelevant,  and  meaningless.  New  ideas  of  the  state, 
of  government  in  relation  to  the  citizen,  were  in  full 
possession  of  the  field  of  thought.  The  individualis- ' 
tic  school  was  hardly  more  than  a  memory.  Gov- 
ernmental interference,  regulative  and  protective 
legislation  in  the  interest  of  the  weak,  the  disin- 
herited, the  ignorant,  and  the  poor  were  all  but  uni- 
versally favored.  Children,  women,  laborers,  me- 
chanics were  held  to  be  entitled  to  the  especial  care 
of  the  modern  democratic  state.  What  was  govern- 
ment, the  argument  ran,  but  co-operation  for  com- 
mon benefits,  and  what  could  be  more  natural  than 
that  victims  of  past  iniquity  or  present  maladjust- 
ment should  invoke  the  aid  of  the  state  in  their  own 
behalf?  After  all,  what  they  demanded  was  simple 
justice,  and  justice  was  the  business  of  the  state, 
because  it  was  essential  to  the  general  welfare,  to 
social  harmony  and  security.  Only  selfish,  reac^ 
tionary  groups  or  classes,  determined  to  preserve 
artificial,  injurious  privileges  and  opposed  to  jus- 
tice, could  object  to  such  state  intervention. 

The  Great  War,  however,  has  brought  about  a 
remarkable  change  in  the  attitude  of  many  thinkers 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     63 

and  philosophers,  not  excepting  socialists,  toward 
the  state  and  government.  A  man  of  the  intellectual 
standing  of  Editor  L.  P.  Jacks,  of  the  Hibbert 
Journal,  confesses  alleged  guilt  in  having  believed 
human  nature  capable  of  such  atrocities  and  bru- 
talities as  the  war  produced,  and  moves  to  quash 
that  indictment.  Not  human  nature,  he  says,  but 
state  nature  is  the  author  of  these  monstrous  crimes 
and  bottomless  woes ;  state  nature  overrides  and 
stifles  weak  human  nature  and  makes  us  cruel,  sav- 
age, bloodthirsty.  State  nature  absolves  us  from 
moral  responsibility.  We  "obey  orders,"  the  orders 
of  the  state.  Hence  the  true  task  of  civilization 
and  humanity  henceforth  is  to  weaken  state  nature 
and  exalt  human  nature.  We  must,  then,  reduce  the 
power  and  importance  of  the  state,  "the  coldest  of 
monsters,"  as  Nietzsche  called  it.  Another  philos- 
opher, Bertrand  Russell,  while  admitting  that  in  cer- 
tain directions  the  power  and  functions  of  the  state 
have  properly  been  increased  and  should  indeed  be 
further  increased,  is  yet  vigorously  belaboring  the 
state  for  alleged  usurpations  in  realms  which  it  can- 
not invade,  according  to  him,  without  spreading  evil 
and  disaster.  Mr.  Russell's  distribution  of  emphasis 
is  different  from  Herbert  Spencer's,  but  the  spirit  is 
the  same  in  the  respective  writings  of  these  British 
thinkers.  Emile  Vandewelde,  the  Belgian  socialist 
leader,  has  been  writing  about  "Socialism  versus  the 
State"! 


54  OUR  REVOLUTION 

It  is  not  surprising  that  lesser  lights  should  also 
be  indulging  in  speculation  concerning  the  future  of 
the  state,  the  amount  of  state-ism  that  may  safely 
be  permitted  to  survive  when  the  stricken  and  ex- 
hausted world  is  regenerated  and  rehabilitated,  and 
the  changes  in  political  methods  and  machinery  that 
should  be  pressed  by  the  democratic  and  progres- 
sive forces  of  society. 

To  some  extent  the  revival  of  the  critical  and  hos- 
tile treatment  of  the  state  is  merely  the  natural 
reaction  from  the  superficial  and  rhetorical  German 
eulogies  of  the  semi-divine  state  that  have  purposely 
and  rightly  been  circulated  among  us  and  among 
our  allies.  Germans  too  often  blindly  worship  the 
state;  they  are  ready  to  die  for  it  or  to  revert  to 
savagery  for  its  sake.  To  them  the  state  is  a 
mystical,  unknowable  institution;  the  glory  and 
strength  of  the  state  would  justify  any  conduct  on 
the  part  of  its  instruments.  The  state  is  above  and 
beyond  our  ethical  conceptions,  or  right  and  wrong. 
Piracy,  treaty  breaking,  treachery,  betrayal  of 
friends,  brutal  treatment  of  neutrals,  merciless  de- 
struction of  enemies — all  these  things  are  permis- 
sible when  decreed  by  or  in  the  name  of  the  German 
state.  It  is  not  strange  that  the  practical,  prag- 
matic, hard-headed  Anglo-Saxons  or  Americans 
should  shudder  at  this  superstitious  worship  of  a 
mere  abstraction  and  should  be  led  to  emphasize,  or 
overemphasize,  the  utilitarian  view  of  the  state,  the 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     55 

idea  that  the  state  is  an  organization  maintained  in 
the  interest  of  order  and  peace,  and  pledged  to 
carry  out  the  ascertained  will  of  the  greatest  num- 
ber of  qualified  votes. 

But  a  little  reflection  will  convince  the  thinking 
person  that  the  Anglo-Saxon  world  has  by  no  means 
solved  the  problems  connected  with  the  state  or  got 
rid  of  the  conflicts  between  the  state  and  the  indi- 
vidual or  the  minority.  The  distinction  between 
state  nature  and  human  nature,  for  example,  is  not 
a  German  distinction,  nor  was  it  meant  to  be  lim- 
ited to  Germany.  In  the  freest  and  most  democratic 
state  individuals  will  do  things  for  the  state  that 
they  would  never  consent  to  do  for  themselves  or 
their  families.  The  shifting  and  evasion  of  moral 
responsibility,  with  all  the  consequences  thereof,  may 
be  observed  in  corporations  as  well  as  in  states. 
Men  do  as  officials,  as  trustees,  as  representatives, 
what  they  would  refuse  to  do  as  individuals,  in  their 
own  interest.  This  is  as  true  of  executions  of  crim- 
inals by  deputy  sheriffs  as  it  is  of  the  misuse  of 
funds  and  dodging  of  taxes  by  directorates  of  pri- 
vate or  quasi-public  companies. 

Surely  we  cannot  contemplate  the  dissolution  of 
all  forms  of  corporate  and  organized  social  action. 
We  cannot  revert  to  the  mythical  state  of  nature  in 
which  simple  human  nature  always  confronted  like 
human  nature — for  good  or  for  ill.  We  cannot 
denounce  and  abrogate  that  unwritten  "social  con- 


56  OUR  REVOLUTION 

tract,"  though,  after  all,  it  never  was  formally  ne- 
gotiated. We  must  and  shall  maintain  all  sorts  and 
conditions  of  political,  social,  economic,  and  other 
organizations  for  the  sake  of  the  undoubted  advan- 
tages of  cooperation  and  collective  action.  We  shall 
not  abolish  the  state  as  a  form  or  organization,  for 
there  is  nothing  we  could  put  in  its  place — unless  it 
be  mobocracy,  lynch  law,  which,  assuredly,  the  most 
vigorous  critics  of  the  organized  modern  state  can- 
not regard  as  an  improvement  thereon.  But,  if  we 
are  to  preserve  the  state,  the  question  that  faces  us 
is,  How  much  power  shall  we  give  it,  and  what 
scope? 

Let  us  assume  that  we  have  made  the  state  as  free 
and  democratic  as  possible.  Let  us  assume  that 
the  franchise  has  been  extended  to  all  men  and  all 
women  of  sound  mind  and  average  honesty;  that 
proportional  representation  has  been  adopted  in 
order  to  give  every  class,  party,  and  group  its  prop- 
er weight  in  government;  that  the  upper  house  of 
the  legislative  body  has  been  radically  mended  or 
ended;  that  the  people  nominate  and  elect  every 
important  official;  that  they  have  all  the  safeguards 
and  checks  that  are  now  deemed  essential,  or  at 
least  desirable,  if  popular  and  democratic  govern- 
ment is  to  be  a  reality;  and  that  so  far  as  organic 
law,  form,  structure,  and  machinery  are  concerned, 
we  have  made  the  state  safe  for  democracy.  The 
question  still  remains,  how  much  power  shall  we 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     57 

intrust    to    and    confer    upon    our    completely    de- 
mocratized state? 

If  it  is  state  nature,  and  not  human  nature,  that 
is  responsible  for  war,  or  for  provocative  diplo- 
macy, shall  we  take  away  from  the  government  the 
power  to  declare  war  or  to  recognize  the  existence 
of  a  state  of  war?  Some  prominent  pacifists  have 
actually  favored  such  a  limitation  as  this;  they 
have  advocated  a  popular  referendum  on  so  vital 
an  issue  as  war  versus  peace.  They  have  favored 
this  as  the  logical  corollary  from  open,  above-board, 
democratic  diplomacy.  But,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
the  two  proposals  do  not  belong  to  the  same  cate- 
gory. Open  diplomacy  undoubtedly  is  a  check  on 
selfish,  tricky  or  arrogant  politicians  clothed  with 
a  little  brief  authority.  Open  diplomacy  is  a  safe- 
guard because  it  implies  public  discussion  of  inter- 
national problems  and  projects  and  because  secret 
diplomacy  means  distrust  and  fear  of  the  electorate 
of  the  democratic  principle  in  government.  To  de- 
mand truly  democratic  government  is  to  demand, 
tacitly,  open  and  frank  diplomacy.  The  question 
of  the  limits  of  state  activity  is  not  involved  here 
at  all.  The  government  is  not  the  state,  nor  is 
the  state  the  government.  Suppose  we  say  that  un- 
der the  truest  and  most  complete  democracy  "the 
state — it  is  the  People."  What  do  we  mean  by  "the 
People"?  Not  the  whole  people,  for  unanimity 


58  OUR  REVOLUTION 

among  the  people  is  almost  unthinkable.  The  ma- 
jority rules  and  must  rule  in  a  democracy,  and  when 
the  minority  submits  its  submits  to  "the  State,"  for 
the  majority  has  spoken  for  the  state.  A  referen-  • 
dum  on  war  would  give  us  nothing  mdre,  at  the 
best,  than  the  decision  of  the  majority.  Should  a 
majority  of  the  voters  decide  for  war,  the  minority 
would  be  forced  to  fight,  to  suffer,  to  pay  heavy 
taxation,  to  mortgage  the  future,  just  as  it  is  forced 
today,  when  war  is  decided  on,  not  by  a  referendum, 
but  by  a  vote  in  Congress  of  a  majority  of  the 
agents  and  representatives  of  the  electors.  It  may 
be  true  that  an  absolutely  democratic  state  would 
not  be  as  apt  to  vote  for  war  as  a  limited  democ- 
racy, although  that  is  distinctly  a  debatable  propo- 
sition. Pacifists  who  are  working  for  greater  de- 
mocracy, for  the  extension  of  the  initiative  and  the 
referendum,  cannot  be  charged  with  inconsistency, 
provided  they  are  satisfied  that  greater  democracy 
means  fewer  wars  and  less  aggressiveness  and  impe- 
rialism in  foreign  affairs.  But  pacifists  and  "unter- 
rified"  democrats  should  not  deceive  themselves  as 
to  the  relative  strength  and  importance  of  state  na- 
ture and  human  nature  in  a  pure  democracy.  A  war 
decreed  by  a  majority  of  the  people  may  be  as  san- 
guinary, as  cruel,  as  remorseles,  as  a  war  decreed 
by  a  congress,  or  by  an  aristocratic  clique,  or  by  a 
single  ruler.  War  itself  is  incompatible  with  de- 
mocracy. War  demands  centralized  control,  unity, 
strict  discipline.  There  can  be  no  referendum  on 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     59 

such  questions  as  military  organization,  the  use  of 
poison  gas,  the  attacking  of  cities  from  the  air, 
etc.  It  should  not  be  forgotten,  by  the  way,  that 
fierce  and  angry  demands  for  reprisals  have  come,  in 
the  recent  war,  from  the  press  and  the  public,  not 
from  the  responsible  men  in  high  positions.  A  ref- 
erendum at  a  time  of  panic  and  resentment  of  some 
new  atrocity  might — nay,  would — result  in  a  mani- 
festation of  "human"  nature  that  would  cause  state 
nature  itself  to  shudder. 

After  all,  if  state  nature  is  bad,  why  does  human 
nature  tolerate  and  submit  to  it?  The  greater  in- 
cludes the  less,  and  evidently  state  nature  is  human- 
ly natural.  Our  quarrel,  then,  is  at  bottom  with 
human  nature,  and  nothing  could  be  more  futile  and 
idle  than  an  indictment  of  human  nature  at  large. 
From  human  nature  no  appeal  can  be  taken  except 
to  the  same  nature.  We  usually  appeal  from  na- 
ture drunk  to  nature  sober,  from  nature  wild  to  na- 
ture chastened,  restrained,  elevated.  In  this  we  are- 
perfectly  well  advised.  Human  nature  is  still  a 
house  badly  divided  against  itself.  There  are  lower 
impulses  and  higher,  selfish  sentiments  and  unselfish, 
ignoble  and  noble.  Moral  evolution  is  as  much  a 
fact  as  physical,  or  scientific,  or  mechanical.  It  is 
possible  to  stimulate,  quicken,  strengthen  the  better 
nature  of  man,  just  as  it  is  possible  to  stimulate  and 
strengthen  man's  lower  nature.  How  to  identify  our- 
selves with  our  better  nature,  how  to  oppose  and  si- 
lence the  demands  we  know  to  be  wrong  and  un- 


60  OUR  REVOLUTION 

worthy,  and  more  successfully  conform  our  conduct 
to  our  professions  and  ideals,  is,  indeed,  a  most  diffi- 
cult and  serious  question.  But  the  point  is  that  that 
is  the  question,  the  only  question,  that  concerns  those 
of  us  who  are  disappointed  and  dissatisfied  with  the 
present  state  of  our  civilization. 

Of  course,  the  appeal  to  the  better  nature  of  man 
is  in  part  an  appeal  to  his  reason,  which  is  regarded 
by  some  thinkers  as  our  "supreme  inheritance." 
What,  we  ask  ourselves,  can  reason  suggest  in  the 
way  of  preventives,  safeguards,  checks,  in  a  word, 
mechanism,  with  a  view  of  preventing  needless  and 
immoral  war  in  the  future?  Can  we  deter  govern- 
ments, parliaments  and  nations  from  wrongful,  pred- 
atory, immoral  acts,  as  our  criminal  law  and  penal 
institutions  are  believed  to  deter  individuals  from 
committing  antisocial  acts?  Are  there  any  lessons 
in  history  and  in  our  own  experience  that  we  have 
not  sufficiently  taken  to  heart  in  the  sphere  of  poli- 
tics and  foreign  relations?  What  can  we  do  in 
this  sphere  that  we  have  not  done? 

Only  when  we  conceive  the  problem  in  some  such 
terms  as  these  does  light  break  upon  us.  Only  then 
do  we  realize  that  by  taking  thought,  by  planning 
and  contriving,  and  by  deliberately  undertaking  to 
obstruct  and  discourage  systems  and  policies  that 
lead  to  war  can  we  effectively  promote  the  cause  of 
peace  and  international  amity. 

Thus  no  one  can  doubt  today  that  secret  diplo- 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?   61 

macy  has  been  in  the  past  a  fatal  source  of  friction 
and  danger.  It  has  become  clear  to  all  that  so  far 
as  possible  secret  diplomacy  should  be  abolished. 
Many  naive  persons  imagine  that  when  this  has  been 
said,  all  has  been  said.  In  truth,  however,  very  lit- 
tle has  been  said.  It  will  not  be  easy  to  wipe  out  all 
the  diplomatic  traditions  and  habits  and  to  make  a 
fresh  start.  One  nation,  or  even  a  group  of  nations, 
could  not  abolish  secret  diplomacy.  Advanced  na- 
tions might  refuse  to  make  secret  treaties,  but  how 
long  would  they  be  able  to  adhere  to  that  virtuous 
and  fine  resolution  if  other  important  powers  con- 
tinued to  negotiate  secret  treaties?  No  nation  can 
isolate  itself  and  ignore  the  realities  of  the  present 
world.  A  nation  has  vital  interests  to  protect  and 
safeguard,  and  if  it  finds  that  it  cannot  do  this 
without  forming  secret  understandings,  because  the 
other  powers  are  not  advanced  or  democratic  enough 
to  renounce  secret  diplomacy,  it  is  not  too  difficult 
to  see  what  will  happen. 

Open  diplomacy  must  tend  to  square  and  honor- 
able dealing.  It  implies  public  discussion  of  foreign 
affairs  and  trust  in  the  people.  It  presupposes  the 
democratization  of  the  diplomatic  service  itself. 
Aristocrats,  as  a  rule,  do  not  understand  or  sym- 
pathize with  democratic  principles.  Even  in  Eng- 
land foreign  affairs  have  been  treated  as  a  sort  of 
special  preserve  for  titled  and  distinguished  person- 
ages. In  the  United  States  a  John  Hay  could  say 


62  OUR  REVOLUTION 

sincerely  that  "our  foreign  policy  is  merely  the 
Golden  Rule  applied  to  foreign  affairs,"  but  how 
many  Americans  accepted  that  affirmation  without 
a  skeptical  smile  or  mental  reserve?  Is  American 
diplomacy  completely  democratized?  The  national 
House  of  Representatives  has  no  voice  in  the  making 
or  unmaking  of  treaties.  The  Senate  holds  secret 
sessions  to  discuss  treaties  or  foreign  affairs.  All 
this  may  have  been  unavoidable  in  the  past,  but  that 
is  beside  the  point.  Suppose  we  take  the  position 
that  henceforth  foreign  affairs  should  be  discussed 
in  open  session,  and  that  the  House  of  Representa- 
tives should  have  as  much  power  as  the  Senate  in 
the  domain  of  treaty  making;  will  that  go  unchal- 
lenged? We  must  expect  considerable  and  stubborn 
opposition,  open  and  democratic  diplomacy,  even  in 
the  United  States.  Nevertheless,  the  idea  is  sound, 
and  the  progressive,  democratic  forces  everywhere, 
should  fight  for  open  diplomacy.  It  is  a  modest 
means,  perhaps,  yet  a  means  to  that  devoutly 
wished-for  consummation,  peace,  and  good-will 
among  the  nations. 

Another  means  to  that  same  end  is  the  creation 
or  development  and  improvement  of  international 
conciliation  and  arbitration  machinery.  Such  ma- 
chinery existed  in  the  fateful  year  1914,  and  Prus- 
sian junkerdom  haughtily  and  arrogantly  frowned 
down  every  effort  to  procure  a  settlement  of  the  so- 
called  Serbian  question  at,  and  by,  the  international 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     63 

court  at  The  Hague.  Nevertheless,  machinery  and 
agencies  that  make  for  delay,  for  discussion,  make 
for  peace.  The  world  needs  more  and  better  ma- 
chinery of  this  type.  It  may  or  may  not  be  possible 
to  form  in  the  near  future  a  strong  League  of  Na- 
tions to  Preserve  Peace.  To  propose  such  a  league 
we  have  seen  was  to  raise  a  hundred  and  one  knotty 
questions.  But  it  is  obvious  that  the  sincere  friends 
of  peace  must  seek  the  partial  solution  of  the  prob- 
lem in  that  general  direction  and  must  be  content  to 
make  short,  experimental  steps. 

In  so  far  as  imperialism,  colonialism,  and  exclu- 
sive trade  advantages  in  backward  countries  have 
produced  conflicts  of  supposed  national  interests, 
"the  open  door"  is  clearly  a  preventive  of  war.  The 
power  that  opposes  the  open  door  serves  notice  that 
it  will  fight  rather  than  accept  equality  of  rights 
and  opportunities.  If  such  powers  still  exist,  mere 
machinery  will  not  remove  the  difficulty.  These  pow- 
ers will  have  to  be  converted  or  coerced;  If  con- 
verted, well  and  good.  If  coerced  into  accepting 
the  open  door  doctrine,  then,  manifestly,  the  coer- 
cion will  be  a  species  of  warfare — perhaps  economic 
warfare.  At  any  rate,  to  establish  and  secure  gen- 
eral acceptance  of  that  principle  would  be  to  remove 
a  most  prolific  source  of  irritation,  controversy,  and 
war. 

Even  more  potent  a  preventive  of  war  than  the 
open  door  is  free  commercial  intercourse  among  the 


64  OUR  REVOLUTION 

civilized  and  industrial  nations.  The  freer  the  com- 
mercial intercourse,  the  better.  The  leveling  of  all 
tariff  walls,  the  destruction  of  all  customs  houses, 
the  complete  freedom  of  international  buying  and 
selling,  is  the  goal  to  be  kept  steadily  in  view ;  but  it 
would  be  folly  to  assume  that  the  recent  war  has 
destroyed,  or  will  destroy,  the  protective  system. 
Many  economists  and  intelligent  men  of  affairs  ad- 
here to  protection  in  principle  and  deem  it  essen- 
tial to  national  welfare  and  prosperity.  To  these 
protection  is  not  a  feature  of  "preparedness"  for 
war  that  will  be  rendered  needless  by  a  permanent 
peace.  It  is  not  likely  that  they  will  change  their 
view  regarding  such  purely  economic,  domestic,  and 
national  questions  as  the  effect  of  high  tariff  rates 
on  wages,  productive  efficiency,  industrial  stability 
and  diversification  of  industry.  Those  who  say  en- 
thusiastically that  free  trade  would  prevent  war  for- 
get that  only  convinced  free  traders  would  entertain 
the  idea  of  repealing  protective  tariff  legislation  in 
order  to  remove  that  particular  cause  of  war.  The 
convinced  and  honest  protectionist  accepts  neither 
the  conclusion  nor  the  premises  of  the  free  trader. 
The  issue,  therefore,  will  long  remain  a  domestic 
and  national  one,  not  to  be  for  a  moment  bracketed 
with  such  questions  as  colonial  open  doors,  arbitra- 
tion machinery,  international  courts,  or  open  diplo- 
macy. 

Self-determination  for  or  by  subject  nationalities 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     65 

or  territories  is  a  principle  that,  if  generally  ac- 
cepted by  the  strong  powers,  would  undoubtedly  go 
far  to  advance  the  cause  of  universal  peace.  But 
none  of  the  strong  powers  has  accepted,  or  will 
accept,  once  for  all  the  policy  of  self-determination 
as  being  applicable  to  any  conceivable  territorial 
dispute.  Only  the  fanatical  and  visionary  Bolshevik 
leaders  could  imagine  that  in  self-determination  they 
had  discovered  a  miraculous,  sovereign  remedy  or 
preventive.  It  was  altogether  sound  and  reasonable 
to  suggest  self-determination  as  a  compromise  ap- 
plicable to  Alsace-Lorraine,  Poland,  Italia  Irreden- 
ta, and  Armenia.  We  know  how  the  military  caste 
of  Prussia  received  that  suggestion.  But  we  should 
not  delude  ourselves  about  the  attitude  of  the  more 
liberal  powers  toward  self-determination.  It  will 
not  be  applied  generally  to  correct  ancient  or  theo- 
retical wrongs.  It  will  be  applied  to  rectify 
past  aggressions  for  the  sake  of  consistency,  logic, 
or  abstract  morality.  Not  even  the  radicals  and  ad- 
vanced laborites  of  Great  Britain  have  entertained 
for  a  moment  the  idea  of  applying  self-determina- 
tion to  Egypt,  India,  or  Ireland.  As  for  the  United 
States,  how  many  of  our  anti-imperialists  would 
seriously  demand  of  the  government  the  immediate 
application  of  self-determination  to  Porto  Rico 
and  the  Philippines?  Radicals  should  clear  their 
minds  of  their  own  cant,  if  they  expect  the  conser- 
vatives to  clear  their  minds  of  hollow  professions 


66  OUR  REVOLUTION 

and  made-to-order  excuses.  Bolshevism  in  inter- 
national, as  in  national,  affairs  leads  to  chaos  and 
retrogression. 

Federalism  in  place  of  a  tyrannical  and  arrogant 
nationalism  is  another  wholesome  and  genuinely  pro- 
gressive and  constructive  principle  which  should  be 
vigorously  and  tactfully  promoted  wherever  condi- 
tions warrant  or  enjoin  its  application.  The  idea 
of  federalism,  of  ample  local  autonomy  and  freedom 
for  cultural  development  combined  with  a  well-de- 
fined surrender  of  certain  powers  and  functions  to 
a  central  authority,  does  in  truth  carry  balm  and 
hope  to  many  oppressed  and  embittered  elements  in 
Europe,  and  especially  in  the  Near  East.  A  ra- 
tional federalism  does  away  with  the  supposed  neces- 
sity of  "nationalizing"  annexed  or  acquired  popula- 
tions, of  suppressing  manifestations  of  racial  or 
cultural  independence.  Federalism  makes  unity  and 
loyalty  possible  despite  variety  and  heterogeneity 
of  component  elements.  Federalism  would  have 
saved  Austria  and  Hungary  from  the  sanguinary 
conflict  they  precipitated  because  of  Serbian  designs 
on  some  of  their  Slav  territory  or  populations. 
Federalism  would  have  saved  the  Balkans  from  dev- 
astation and  appalling  waste  of  human  resources. 
Federalism  may  yet  save  Russia,  as  it  certainly  has 
saved  the  United  States.  Federalism,  therefore,  is 
one  of  the  surest  ways  to  peace  and  guaranties  of 
peace. 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     67 

In  the  light  of  all  that  has  been  said,  is  it  not 
clear  that,  instead  of  asking  the  barren  question, 
What  shall  we  do  with  the  state? — instead  of  setting 
up  an  unreal  distinction  between  wicked  state  nature 
and  benevolent  human  nature — the  true  and  per* 
tinent  question  to  put  to  ourselves  is,  What  can 
friends  of  peace  do  other  than,  and  additional  to, 
that  which  has  been  done,  to  limit,  localize,  averi^ 
and  prevent  armed  conflicts  between  states?  In 
other  words,  how  can  we  put  an  end  to  anarchy, 
the  reign  of  brute  force,  in  international  relations 
and  substitute  as  much  law  and  reason  in  that 
sphere  as  we  have  succeeded  in  substituting  for 
anarchy,  strife,  and  force  in  the  relations  of  the 
citizens  or  subjects  of  any  fairly  efficient  modem 
state. 

If  these  citizens  or  subjects  do  not  want  peace 
with  their  neighbors  in  other  states,  no  effective 
machinery,  no  safeguards  and  checks,  will  be  in- 
stalled by  them.  If  they  have  racial  and  national- 
istic antipathies  that  cloud  their  reasoning  powers 
and  impel  them  to  fight  on  the  least  provocation,  or 
without  any  provocation  at  all;  if  they  are  jealous, 
envious,  and  malicious  toward  such  neighbors ;  if 
they  covet  the  goods  or  territories  of  such  neighbors 
and  are  not  ashamed  to  embark  on  predatory  enter- 
prises, on  what  Spencer  called  international  burg- 
lary, in  order  to  grab  such  goods  or  territories, 
then  it  is  safe  to  say  that  appeals  to  their  "human 


68  OUR  REVOLUTION 

nature"  will  be  as  vain  as  appeal  to  the  nature  of 
the  animal  or  bird  of  prey. 

Again,  if  there  are  multitudes  of  citizens  or  sub- 
jects who  rather  welcome  war,  openly  or  secretly, 
and  who  cannot  be  counted  on  to  support  any 
genuine  peace  movement,  it  is  necessary  to  determine 
scientifically  the  approximate  strength  of  these  ele- 
ments in  a  modern  industrial  and  civilized  community 
and  to  ascertain  the  cause  of  so  strange,  reactionary, 
and  socially  prenicious  an  attitude.  How  can  sane 
and  normal  human  beings  rejoice  in  wholesale  mur- 
der, waste,  destruction,  torture,  anguish,  misery? 
After  all,  this  is  what  the  little  word  "war"  means, 
and  can  anyone  who  is  not  a  ferocious  barbarian 
contemplate  such  things  with  satisfaction  or  even 
equanimity  and  indiff erence  ? 

It  will  not  do  to  say  that  there  are  no  such  human 
beings.  The  facts  are  too  glaring  and  to  well  estab- 
lished to  be  overlooked.  There  are  men  to  whom 
war  is  a  great,  high  adventure.  There  are  men  to 
whom  war  is  a  temporary  relief  from  drudgery,  mo- 
notony, and  a  hopeless  struggle  against  want  and 
privation.  Exhortations  and  propaganda  by  pac- 
ifists never  reach  such  men.  To  change  them,  we 
must  change  the  whole  social  atmosphere  first.  So- 
ciety must  provide  "moral  equivalents  of  war,"  to 
use  a  phrase  of  the  late  William  James.  The  con- 
ditions of  life,  labor,  and  recreation  for  hosts  of 
men — and  women — must  be  radically  changed,  and 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     69 

the  changes  required  cannot  be  decreed  by  rulers  or 
revolutionary  assemblies.  They  will  be  the  product 
of  slow  evolution. 

In  short,  and  to  sum  up,  a  little  candid  analysis 
and  reflection  will  satisfy  the  thinking  person  that 
an  attack  on  state  nature  by  the  pacifists  and  philos- 
ophers who  are  appalled  by  the  awful  slaughter  and 
waste  of  the  world-war  is  an  attack  on  phantoms 
or  empty  abstractions.  Neither  the  abolition  nor 
the  complete  democratization  of  the  state  will  abolish 
war.  The  distinction  between  human  nature  and 
state  nature  is  superficial  and  arbitrary.  The  prob- 
lem of  war  and  peace  is  so  fundamental- and  so  broad 
that  its  solution  presupposes  and  involves  the  solu- 
tion of  a  score  of  knotty,  complex,  and  historic  prob- 
lems— problems  of  social  and  economic  organization, 
of  domestic  and  international  law,  of  education  and 
of  ethics  and  philosophy.  To  fight  war  is  to  fight 
imperialism,  nationalism,  and  militarism.  Several 
scholarly  writers  have  pointed  out  that  militarism 
is  more  than  an  institution — it  is  a  state  of  mind,  a 
body  of  ideas  and  prejudices.  The  same  thing  is 
true  of  imperialism,  of  nationalism,  of  protectionism. 
The  democratization  and  purification  of  the  political 
organization  called  the  state  is  only  one  of  the  prob- 
lems, and  by  no  means  the  most  difficult  one,  faced 
by  lovers  of  humanity  and  peace. 

So  far  the  discussion  has  dealt  with  certain  recent 
indictments  by  humanitarians  and  philosophers  of 


70  OUR  REVOLUTION 

so-:called  state  nature — indictments  based  on  the  for- 
eign policies  of  the  great  nations — and  the  criminal, 
aggressive  wars  directly  or  indirectly  attributable  to 
those  policies.  The  attempt  has  been  to  point  out 
the  superficiality  of  those  indictments  and  the  neces- 
sity of  a  very  different  analysis  of  the  international 
situation  than  that  which  underlies  the  notion  that 
the  state  as  such,  or  state  nature,  is  somehow  re- 
sponsible for  the  diplomacy  of  intrigue,  conquest, 
aggression,  and  greed. 

In  the  following  pages  the  alleged  responsibility  of 
"the  state"  for  political,  social,  and  economic  evils 
"at  home"  will  be  discussed.  Shall  we  abolish  the 
state  ?  Can  we  abolish  it  ?  Should  we  get  rid  of  the 
evils  and  maladjustments  complained  of  by  liberals 
and  radicals  if  we  could,  and  did,  abolish  the  state? 

First  of  all,  what  is  the  state  ?  A  correct  answer  is 
clearly  essential,  yet  is  hardly  ever  given.  The 
proper  answer  is,  The  state  is  another  name  for  com- 
pulsory co-operation.  A  certain  community,  or 
state,  or  nation,  organizes  itself,  a  government  is 
created,  legislation  adopted,  and  the  individual,  or 
the  minority,  has  no  choice,  no  alternative,  but  to 
obey  the  law  of  the  state.  In  the  freest  and  most 
democratic  modern  state,  despite  such  devices  as  the 
initiative,  the  referendum,  the  recall,  local  home  rule, 
the  element  of  compulsion  is  necessarily  always  pres- 
ent. If  all  co-operation  were  voluntary;  if  the  ma- 
jority had  no  right  to  coerce  the  minority;  if  gov- 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     71 

ernment  actually,  and  in  the  literal  sense,  rested  on 
the  "consent  of  all  the  governed,"  there  would  be 
no  state.  There  would  be  spontaneous  collective 
action  along  many  lines,  no  doubt,  just  as  today 
there  is  co-operation  for  religious,  social,  ethical, 
political,  and  aesthetic  purposes  sans  the  slightest 
suggestion  of  physical  force  or  compulsion.  But 
the  state,  as  we  know  it,  would  have  disappeared. 

Now,  this  is  exactly  what  the  pacific  and  philo- 
sophical anarchists  mean  by  "abolition  of  the  state." 
They  would  gradually  restrict  the  authority  of  the 
state,  increasingly  free  the  individual  and  the  minor- 
ity, and  at  last  make  even  taxation  and  military 
service  entirely  voluntary  under  all  conditions.  They 
accordingly  insist  on  the  right  of  the  individual  to 
secede  from,  or  ignore,  the  state.  They  would,  of 
course,  use  force  to  prevent  aggression  or  invasion 
by  any  individual ;  they  would  punish  "crime" — that 
is,  violations  of  the  principle  of  equal  freedom  and 
equal  opportunity — but  with  the  inoffensive,  peace- 
able individual,  no  matter  how  selfish,  unsocial,  un- 
yielding he  might  be,  they  would  not  interfere — ex- 
cept, possibly,  to  the  extent  of  boycotting  him  and 
impressing  upon  him  the  fact  that  he  is  deemed  an 
unpleasant  and  undesirable  neighbor. 

This  is  the  general  idea  Thoreau,  the  New  England 
recluse  and  intense  individualist,  vaguely  entertained 
when,  for  example,  he  wrote  the  following  lines : 


73  OUR  REVOLUTION 

I  heartily  accept  the  motto  (of  Thomas  Jeffer- 
son) :  "That  government  is  best  which  governs 
least";  and  I  should  like  to  see  it  acted  up  to  more 
rapidly  and  systematically.  Carried  out,  it  finally 
amounts  to  this,  which  also  I  believe:  "That  govern- 
ment is  best  which  governs  not  at  all";  and  when 
men  are  prepared  for  it,  that  will  be  the  kind  of 
government  which  they  will  have. 

The  progress  from  an  absolute  to  a  limited  mon- 
archy, from  a  limited  monarchy  to  a  democracy,  is 
a  progress  toward  a  true  respect  for  the  individual. 
But  is  a  democracy,  such  as  we  know  it,  the  last  im- 
provement possible  in  government?  Is  it  not  possi- 
ble to  take  a  step  further  toward  recognizing  and  or- 
ganizing the  rights  of  man? 

There  never  will  be  a  free  and  enlightened  state 
until  the  state  comes  to  recognize  the  individual  as  a 
higher  and  independent  power,  from  which  all  its 
own  power  and  authority  are  derived,  and  treats 
him  accordingly.  I  please  myself  with  imagining  a 
state  at  least  which  can  afford  to  be  just  to  all  men, 
and  to  treat  the  individual  with  respect  as  a  neigh- 
bor; which  even  would  not  think  it  inconsistent  with 
its  own  repose  if  a  few  were  to  live  aloof  from  it,  not 
meddling  with  it,  nor  embraced  by  it,  who  fulfilled- all 
the  duties  of  neighbors  and  fellowmen.  A  state 
which  bore  this  kind  of  fruit,  and  suffered  it  to  drop 
off  as  fast  as  it  ripened,  would  prepare  the  way  for 
a  still  more  perfect  and  glorious  state  which  also  I 
have  imagined,  but  have  not  yet  anywhere  seen. 

Who  will  object  to  these  ideals  and  conceptions? 
But  the  difficulty  with  them  as  expressed  is  their 
strange,  complete  irrelevance  to  any  actual  prob- 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     73 

lem  of  which  we  are  conscious  and  which  presses  for 
a  solution.  Suppose  we  accept  the  view  that  the 
society  of  the  future  will  be  held  together  in  the 
way  outlined  by  the  logical  and  uncompromising 
individualists.  What  follows?  What  is  the  bear- 
ing of  that  admission  on  our  own  situation?  What 
practical  program  is  suggested  by  the  ideal  of  a  free, 
state-less  society?  What  are  the  steps  to  be  taken 
today — this  year,  next  year,  the  year  after,  ten 
years  hence,  and  so  on — with  a  view  to  reaching,  at 
some  distant  day,  the  remote  goal? 

We  know  what  the  answer  is :  Repeal,  repeal,  and 
again  repeal.  Society  can  only  become  free  by  re- 
moving one  restriction  after  another,  destroying  one 
barrier  after  another,  to  the  freest  human  inter- 
course. Free  trade,  free  access  to  land,  free  bank- 
ing, free  issue  of  notes  to  circulate  as  currency,  free 
association  for  any  and  all  purposes  not  inherently 
immoral  or  criminal — this  is  the  individualist  plat- 
form. 

Sound  or  unsound,  this  platform  is  certainly  defin- 
ite. But  how  many  of  the  men  and  women  who  are 
discontented  and  rebellious,  and  who  talk  about 
radical  changes  in  the  organization  of  "the  capital- 
istic state,"  accept  the  individualist  views  con- 
cerning protection,  monopoly,  banking,  currency, 
and  land  tenure.  Metaphysical  discussion  of  the 
nature  of  sovereignty,  limitations  upon  the  power  of 
the  state,  or  the  natural  rights  of  the  individual 


74  OUR  REVOLUTION 

throws  no  light  whatever  on  questions  of  economics. 
So  great  is  the  confusion  of  thought  that  a  man  may 
in  the  same  breath  urge  the  abolition  of  the  state  and 
propose  high  protective  duties,  or  a  government  mo- 
nopoly of  coinage  and  currency !  It  is  futile  to  paint 
alluring  pictures  of  a  free,  state-less  society  when, 
as  a  matter  of  fact,  only  a  most  insignificant  minor- 
ity is  prepared  anywhere  to  take  the  first  steps 
toward  the  alleged  goal — namely,  to  repeal  tariff 
laws,  banking  laws,  currency  laws,  patent  and  copy- 
right laws,  and  a  hundred  other  regulative  and  re- 
strictive laws  supposed  to  be  necessary  for  the  pro- 
tection of  the  poor,  the  uneducated,  the  credulous, 
the  weak! 

The  problems  of  our  period  are  primarily  eco- 
nomic. The  revolt  being  witnessed  is  a  revolt  against 
poverty,  gross  inequality  in  the  distribution  of 
wealth,  chronic  unemployment,  and  the  like.  How 
many  of  the  radicals  believe  that  "the  abolition  of 
the  state"  in  the  anarchistic  sense  would  do  away 
with  these  evils?  To  be  sure,  the  socialists  of  the 
Marx  school,  too,  have  attacked  "the  state"  and 
professed  a  desire  to  kill  it.  Under  socialism  prop- 
erly understood,  we  have  been  assured  in  books  and 
periodicals,  the  state  dies,  or  dissolves  into  something 
totally  different.  When  we  analyze  these  affirma- 
tions, what  do  we  find?  A  totally  arbitrary  as- 
sumption that  the  state  is  a  capitalistic  device,  an 
instrument  of  oppression  and  enslavement,  and  that 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     75 

to  abolish  capitalism,  nationalize  industry,  make 
everyone  an  employee  of  the  community,  is  to  kill 
the  state. 

Nothing  can  be  more  absurd  and  empty  than  this. 
The  implied  definition  of  the  state  in  the  socialist 
declamations  against  it  is  erroneous.  Granted  that 
there  is  such  a  thing  as  a  capitalistic  state,  as 
there  was  such  a  thing  as  a  military  and  aristo- 
cratic state,  it  clearly  does  not  follow  that  to  de- 
stroy any  particular  type  of  state  is  to  destroy  the 
state.  There  is  also  a  democratic  state,  and  a  so- 
cialistic state.  The  Russian  Bolshevik  leaders  are 
Marxian  socialists,  but  they  have  certainly  not  de- 
stroyed the  state.  They  lost  no  time  in  setting  up  a 
proletarian  state,  as  they  called  their  non-proletar- 
ian tyranny.  They  dispossessed  and  disfranchised 
the  bourgeois  elements,  but  they  had  the  decency  to 
refrain  from  pretending  that  they  were  abolishing 
the  state.  They  admitted  that  they  were  setting 
up  a  dictatorship,  a  despotism,  a  state  after  their 
own  heart.  They  had  all  manner  of  excuses,  of 
course;  the  dictatorship  was  to  be  temporary;  the 
revolution  had  to  be  saved  at  any  cost,  and  the  ene- 
mies of  socialism  were  wicked  counter- revolutionists, 
who  deserved  condign  punishment  and  effective  re- 
straint. The  intention  was  to  usher  in  a  reign  of 
brotherhood  and  equality,  to  replace  capitalism  by 
harmonious  co-operation.  Meantime  Lenin  and  his 


76  OUR  REVOLUTION 

fanatical  followers  were  to  be  "the  state" — and  a 
ruthless  state  in  truth  it  has  been. 

Let  us,  however,  recognize  the  distinction  between 
emergency,  or  war,  policies  on  the  part  of  socialist 
or  communist  reformers,  and  permanent  policies  that 
are  to  obtain  under  normal  conditions.  Would  so- 
cialism under  normal  conditions  dispense  with  the 
state — kill  the  state?  "No"  is  the  answer,  if,  as  has 
been  shown,  the  essence  of  the  state  is  compulsion. 
Would  a  socialist  state  permit  the  individual  to 
secede  from  it,  to  ignore  it,  to  cultivate  his  little 
patch,  and  exchange  his  products  with  his  neighbors 
without  paying  the  state  any  kind  of  tax  or  tribute? 
Would  the  socialist  state  renounce  the  right  to  con- 
script men  into  military  service,  or  the  right  to  im- 
pose taxes  on  dissenting  minorities?  Where  and 
when  has  any  socialist  author  or  leader  proposed  to 
kill  the  state  in  this  sense — to  depend  entirely  and 
undeservedly  on  voluntary  co-operation,  and  to  base 
government  on  the  actual  consent  of  all  of  the  gov- 
erned? There  are  individualist  writers  who  assert 
that  the  socialist  state  would  revert  to  involuntary 
servitude  and  would  coerce  the  workman  to  a  far 
greater  degree  than  the  capitalistic  state  has  done. 
Let  us  not  hastily  subscribe  to  such  charges  as  these. 
Certain  it  is,  however,  that  the  socialist  state  would 
not  even  attempt  to  dispense  with  compulsion  and 
coercion  of  non-invasive  individuals.  The  majority 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     77 

would  rule — at  least  in  respect  of  essentials.  How, 
then,  can  it  be  maintained  that  socialism  would  de- 
stroy statism? 

At  this  point  the  Guild  socialist  may  be  imagined 
as  appearing-  on  the  stage  and  making  his  plea.  No, 
indeed;  orthodox  socialism  is  incurably  statist  and 
tyrannical,  and  this  very  fact  explains  the  advent  of 
the  guild  socialists.  They  are  not  juggling  with 
words;  tliey  are  not  guilty  of  inconsistency.  They 
distrust  the  state  and  would  reduce  it  to  a  minimum. 
For  this  reason  they  would  give  industrial  guilds  the 
maximum  of  autonomy,  they  would  encourage  the 
formation  of  other  associations  for  various  pur- 
poses ;  they  would  stimulate  voluntary  co-operation 
in  a  hundred  directions.  The  jurisdiction  of  the 
state  would  be  so  limited  that  its  present  claim  to 
a  mysterious  sanctity,  to  metaphysical  authority, 
would  appear  ridiculous,  and  utility  would  become 
the  sole  title  of  the  state  to  respect.  Within  its 
sphere,  however,  the  state  would  use  compulsion  and 
possess  sufficient  authority  to  prevent  usurpation  or 
abuse  of  power  by  the  autonomous  guilds,  or  other 
local  and  functional  organizations. 

Manifestly,  the  guild  socialists,  though  sincere 
in  their  libertarian  professions,  beg  the  real  issue, 
or  at  least  ignore  it.  They  do  not  propose  to  kill 
the  state,  but  merely  to  limit  its  jurisdictions  and 
force  it,  as  one  writer  has  said,  to  come  down  from 
its  present  "sovereign"  pedestal  and  surrender  some 


78  OUR  REVOLUTION 

of  its  powers,  and  functions  to  guild  organizations. 
Their  plan  may  indeed  promise  greater  efficiency 
than  any  reasonable  person  can  expect  from  a 
bureaucratic  and  despotic  state;  it  may,  too,  prove 
more  alluring  to  lovers  of  freedom  and  appreciative 
students  of  human  personality.  Still,  the  state  would 
be  perpetuated  by  guild  socialists,  and  on  supreme 
questions  its  fiat  would  be  law. 

The  syndicalists  assert  that  this  would  abolish  the 
capitalistic  state  and  prevent  the  establishment  of 
a  democratic  or  socialist  state,  but  what  would  be 
their  syndicate  if  not  a  small  state,  and  what  their 
federation  of  syndicates  but  a  confederation  of  small 
states.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  syndicalism  is  a  paper 
scheme  that  would  break  down  at  the  first  touch 
of  reality — that  would  spell  confusion  worse  con- 
founded, and  sooner  or  later  lead  to  the  restoration 
of  a  despotic  state.  As  Mr.  Bertrand  Russell  ar- 
gues, the  syndicalists  have  outlined  no  modus  ope- 
randi  to  settle  controversies  among  the  autonomous 
industrial  organizations,  or  between  any  of  them  and 
the  consuming  public.  To  affirm  that  the  syndical- 
ist directorates  would  be  at  all  times  amenable  to 
reason  and  properly  regardful  of  interests  other  than 
those  of  their  particular  industrial  group — the 
miners,  say,  or  the  railroad  workmen,  or  the  able 
seamen — and  that  justice  would  be  done  in  every 
case  without  prejudice  or  passion,  is  to  revert  to 
Utopian  socialism  with  a  vengeance.  But  even  if 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     79 

we  should  admit  for  the  sake  of  the  argument  that 
syndicalism  is  practical,  all  that  would  be  implied 
by  the  admission  is  that  the  modern  or  the  tradi- 
tional state  is  too  powerful  and  therefore  too  dan- 
gerous, and  that  the  time  has  come  to  replace  it  by 
a  congeries  of  small,  weak  states.  For,  manifestly, 
the  syndicate  would  be  neither  more  nor  less  than  a 
small  state.  The  syndicate  would  have  its  direc- 
torate, its  officers,  its  representative  assembly,  its 
referendum  system,  its  rules  and  regulations.  The 
majority  would  govern  the  syndicate  within  cer- 
tain constitutionally  prescribed  limits,  and  the  mi- 
nority would  have  no  choice  but  to  obey.  The 
majority  might  allow  individuals  to  withdraw  from 
the  syndicate,  but  this  right  would  have  to  be  quali- 
fied and  reconciled  with  the  requirements  of  effi- 
ciency and  stability.  The  advantages  of  such  with- 
drawal would  be  problematical,  moreover,  since  the 
seceding  individual  or  group  would,  in  order  to  live 
and  earn  wages,  be  forced  to  join  some  other  syn- 
dicate. 

Syndicalism  would  abolish,  to  be  sure,  the  "polit- 
ical" state,  but  it  would  substitute  for  it  the  "ad- 
ministrative" state.  There  are  writers  and  think- 
ers who  derive  great  comfort  from  this  anticipated 
change,  but  it  is  to  be  feared  that  they  are  the  vic- 
tims of  illusions  and  verbal  juggles.  Cannot  an  ad- 
ministrative state  be  even  more  tyrannical  and  ar- 


80  OUR  REVOLUTION 

bitrary  than  our  political  state?  Cannot  a  trade 
union  be  oppressive  and  despotic?  Is  "administra- 
tion" protected  by  some  magic,  invisible  shield  from 
the  vices  and  evils  of  political  and  bureaucratic  gov- 
ernment ? 

We  must  conclude,  then,  first,  that  none  of  the 
modern  schools  of  thought  really  purposes  to  abol- 
ish the  state,  and,  second,  that  the  individualistic 
and  philosophical  anarchists,  who  would  like  to  abol- 
ish it,  and  know  exactly  what  is  meant  by  the  phrase 
"abolishing  the  state,"  admit  that  their  goal  is  very 
distant  and  from  any  practical  viewpoint  utopian, 
since  more  than  sufficient  unto  the  day  are  the  very 
first  steps  suggested  toward  that  goal. 

Is  there,  then,  no  problem  before  us  that  concerns 
the  state,  its  structure  and  form,  its  basis  and  pil- 
lars? Are  those  who  are  asserting  that  the  state 
is  undergoing  profound  modifications  imagining  vain 
things?  Does  the  state  require  no  substantial 
changes?  Has  it  adapted  itself  to  the  needs  and 
conditions  of  our  age  and  is  now  functioning  as  it 
should?  By  no  means.  It  is  true  that  the  State  is 
"in  transition,"  and  that  vital  and  important 
changes  are  clearly  ahead  of  it.  The  nature  of  the 
changes  is  doubtless  indicated  by  recent  develop- 
ments. They  are,  however,  often  magnified  and  even 
misapprehended. 

In   the  first   place,   there  is   much   confusion   in 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     81 

radical  minds  with  regard  to  the  further  democrati- 
zation of  the  state.  That  the  state  has  been,  is 
being,  and  will  continue  to  be  "democratized,"  is  a 
truism  nowadays,  but  in  what  sense  is  the  term  de- 
mocracy as  applied  to  the  state  to  be  used?  With 
a  curious  inconsistency  many  radical  writers  ad- 
vocate at  the  same  time  the  emancipation  of  the 
individual  and  the  complete  democratization  of  the 
state !  Democracy  is,  however,  very  far  from  being 
synonymous  with  individual  liberty.  If  a  completely 
democratized  state  means  a  state  in  which  the  ma- 
jority rules  absolutely,  and  in  all  departments  of 
activity,  and  in  which  individuals  and  minorities  en- 
joy none  of  the  guaranties  which,  for  example,  they 
are  accorded  by  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States,  then  the  democratization  of  the  state  will 
mean  the  enslavement  of  the  individual.  Minority 
government,  oligarchical  government,  >  plutocratic 
government,  are  severally  intolerable,  and  embattled 
majorities  are  now  rightly  seeking  to  destroy  such 
forms  of  government.  But  majority  government  is 
not  necessarily  just  or  free  government,  and  within 
certain  limits  the  individual  and  the  minority  must 
always  be  protected  from  majority  aggression. "" On 
this  point  the  alleged  wwdemocratic  features  of  the 
American  system  are  sound  in  principle,  though  no 
doubt  far  from  perfect  and  open  to  much  improve- 
ment. We  cannot,  in  the  name  of  democracy,  sup- 
press freedom  of  speech  or  of  the  press,  or  religious 


82  OUR  REVOLUTION 

freedom,  or  artistic  freedom,  or  freedom  in  personal 
and  domestic  conduct  up  to  a  certain  point.  To 
exalt  and  free  the  nonconforming  individual  is  to 
restrain  and  curb  the  majority  or  the  democratic 
state. 

Again,  the  very  people  who  are  condemning  the 
present  state  because  of  its  arrogant  assumption  of 
sovereignty,  its  disregard  of  individual  rights,  the 
individual  conscience,  and  the  like,  are  clamorously 
demanding  additional  protective,  regulative,  restric- 
tive legislation  in  the  interest  of  the  greater  or  great- 
est number,  of  the  majority.  Send  profiteers  to 
prison !  is  the  cry.  License  all  big  corporations ! 
Regulate  prices  and  profits !  Stop  hoarding  and 
speculation  !  These  policies  may  be  democratic,  they 
may  be  necessary  evils,  but  they  are  not  consonant 
with  individual  and  minority  freedom,  with  the  pro- 
fessed intention  of  starving  and  eventually  killing 
the  state.  The  consistent  anti-statist  may  not  admire 
profiteers  and  hoarders  and  food  gamblers,  but  he 
would  not  regulate  them  by  statutory  law.  He  would 
trust  the  law  of  supply  and  demand  in  a  free  market. 
He  would  suffer  temporary  hardship  and  loss,  but 
he  would  not  sacrifice  personal  and  economic  liberty. 
To  favor  increased  regulation  of  industry  and  com- 
merce is  not  to  kill  the  state,  but  rather  to 
strengthen  it  and  give  it  a  new  lease  of  life. 

Assuming,  however,  that  there  are  democrats  who 
are  also  good  libertarians,  and  rational  libertarians 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     83 

who  are  also  good  practical  democrats,  the  ques- 
tion recurs,  What  would  these  do  with  the  state? 
How  would  they  improve  it  ?  First  of  all,  they  would 
deprive  it  of  much  of  its  occupation  by  re-estab- 
lishing genuine  equality  of  opportunity  and  indus- 
trial democracy.  When  crime  and  criminal  vice 
abound,  the  state  has  much  to  do,  and  there  can  be 
no  talk  of  killing  it.  When  artificial  monopoly  and 
iniquitous  privilege  militate  against  the  equitable 
and  wholesome  distribution  of  wealth  and  enable  the 
few  to  exploit  the  many,  appeals  go  up  from  a 
thousand  directions  to  the  supposedly  mighty  state, 
and  legislation  is  sought  in  behalf  of  the  poor,  the 
weak,  the  disinherited.  When  commercial  warfare 
and  tariff  or  other  discriminations  threaten  war  or 
bring  it  about,  the  state  metaphorically  rubs  its 
hands  in  glee  and  knows  that  its  power  and  prestige 
are  about  to  receive  coveted  immunity  from  criti- 
cism. War  and  preparedness  for  war  always  re- 
vivify the  state  and  silence,  its  theoretical  enemies. 
War  tends  to  tyranny.  War  is  intolerant.  War 
makes  the  state  sovereign. 

Peace,  plenty,  opportunity,  economic  justice,  on 
the  other  hand,  tend  to  weaken  the  state.  Free  and 
prosperous  men  do  not  need  much  government.  To 
fight  poverty,  involuntary  idleness,  and  unmerited 
misery  is,  therefore,  to  fight  the  present  state.  In- 
dustrial freedom  will  pave  the  way  for  greater  polit- 
ical freedom.  This  is  why  the  enlightened  liber- 


84  OUR  REVOLUTION 

tarian  is  not  to-day  greatly  interested  in  academic 
attacks  on  the  metaphysical  state  or  the  political 
state.  He  is  interested  in  well-directed  attacks  on 
special  privilege  and  shielded,  protected  monopolies, 
knowing  that  to  get  rid  of  these  is  to  eradicate 
much  poverty  and  much  of  the  crime,  vice,  and 
brutality  that  poverty  breeds.  He  who  fights  for 
economic  and  social  reform  fights  for  the  emancipa- 
tion of  the  soul  of  the  individual  as  well,  or  for 
the  curtailment  of  the  authority  of  the  state.  Flank 
attacks  on  the  state  are  far  more  effective  at  this 
stage  of  evolution  than  frontal  attacks. 

Yet  there  is  no  reason  why  in  some  sectors  of  the 
battle  line  a  direct  attack  on  the  present  "political" 
state  should  not  be  attempted.  The  governmental 
machine  is  breaking  down,  and  the  causes  of  this 
breakdown  are  not  exclusively,  though  chiefly,  eco- 
nomic. Representative  government  very  often  seems 
to  represent  only  the  tricky  and  seamy  side  of  human 
nature.  Men  elected  to  represent  mixed  constituen- 
cies often  lack  the  courage  to  take  definite  positions 
on  important  questions  and  "play  safe"  by  trim- 
ming, drifting,  and  pretending  to  be  all  things  to  all 
men.  There  are  too  many  demagogues,  time-servers, 
shifty  politicians  (called  "practical"),  in  the  public 
life  of  every  democracy.  Such  men  have  no  intel- 
lectual or  moral  fitness  for  the  functions  they  are 
supposed  to  discharge.  The  result  is  futile,  insin- 
cere, and  ineffective  legislation,  evasion  and  palter- 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     85 

ing  and  endless  delays  in  attending  to  ripe  problems 
that  demand  earnest  discussion  and  statesmanlike 
action. 

Even  the  average  man,  who  is  no  philosopher,  is 
disappointed  in  the  conditions  or  prospects  of  mod- 
ern democracy.  He  rails  at  politicians  and  politics. 
He  does  not  expect  efficiency  or  integrity  of  demo- 
cratic government.  He  refuses  to  take  seriously 
campaigns  against  waste,  extravagance,  or  "graft." 
He  sneers  at  party  platforms,  made,  as  he  says,  "to 
get  in  on  but  not  to  stand  on."  He  is  skeptical  re- 
garding the  success  of  proposed  reforms  of  the  fa- 
miliar type — for  so  many  of  them  have  been  tried 
and  found  empty  and  fruitless. 

This  aspect  of  the  democratic  situation  cannot 
and  need  not  be  ignored.  It  is  responsible  for  much 
of  the  sympathy,  interest,  and  enthusiasm  which  the 
Russian  soviet  system  has  aroused  in  liberal  and 
progressive  circles.  The  Russian  Bolshevik  idealists, 
we  are  assured  by  many,  have  shown  us  the  way  out 
— have  evolved  what  Lenine  calls  "a  higher  form  of 
democracy"  than  that  of  England,  France,  or 
America.  Let  us  abolish  our  legislatures  and  ex- 
ecutives, and  "sovietize"  our  state  and  national  gov- 
ernments, cry  some  superficial  radicals. 

The  soviet  system  has  nothing  to  do  with  Bolshe- 
vism, terrorism,  Leninism,  or  the  dictatorship  of  a 
class.  It  does  offer  hints  to  advanced  democracies, 


86  OUR  REVOLUTION 

and  its  failure  in  Russia,  which  is  certain,  will  not 
prove  its  total  want  of  merit. 

We  must  make  our  legislatures  more  represen- 
tative and  more  efficient.  This  can  be  done,  un- 
doubtedly, by  substituting,  at  least  to  some  extent, 
representation  of  industries,  social  groups,  schools 
of  opinions,  vocations,  and  functions  for  the  repre- 
sentation of  geographical  areas,  heterogeneous  pop- 
ulations, and  nebulous  partisan  policies.  This  sub- 
stitution is  the  essence  of  the  soviet  system,  and  it  is 
worth  studying  and  experimenting  with  under  favor- 
able circumstances. 

There  is  no  reason  why  those  American  states 
that  have  been  discussing  the  possibility  of  applying 
the  commission  plan  of  government  to  states,  or  of 
abolishing  the  upper  chamber  of  the  state  legislature 
and  experimenting  with  a  unicameral  general  assem- 
bly, should  not  seriously  consider  an  experiment 
along  the  Russian  soviet  lines.  They  might  retain 
the  state  senate,  but  provide  for  the  election  of  its 
members  not,  as  now,  by  the  body  of  voters,  but  by 
electoral  colleges  representing  industrial  guilds,  com- 
mercial associations,  bankers  and  brokers,  mer- 
chants, trade  unions,  professional  and  scientific  bod- 
ies, etc.  Years  ago  Herbert  Spencer,  if  memory 
serves,  suggested  the  reformation  of  the  British 
House  of  Lords  after  the  manner  just  indicated.  He 
would  not  have  favored  the  soviet  plan  in  its  en- 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     87 

tirety,  but  he  recognized  the  defects  of  Parliament 
— Carlyle's  "Talking  Machine" — and  the  necessity 
of  such  changes  in  the  electoral  system  as  might  in- 
sure the  adequate  representation  of  the  ability,  the 
enterprise,  the  intelligence,  the  character,  and  the 
industry  of  the  nation  in  the  parliament.  A  revising 
chamber  of  experts,  of  men  who  "do  things,"  who 
have  had  special  training  for  constructive  and  posi- 
tive work,  would  undoubtedly  give  a  much  better 
account  of  itself  than  a  chamber  of  lawyers  and 
politicians — especially  of  lawyers  and  politicians 
nominated  and  elected  by  partisan  machines  and 
local  bosses. 

In  addition  to  a  revising  chamber  of  the  type 
suggested,  or  pending  the  adoption  of  constitutional 
amendments  permitting  the  creation  and  election 
of  such  a  senate,  national,  state,  and  local  coun- 
cils might  be  organized  for  the  purpose  of  deliber- 
ating on  industrial,  social,  and  mixed  problems, 
carrying  on  investigations  and  tendering  formal  ad- 
vice to  the  legislature.  Such  industrial  councils 
are  being  organized,  or  at  least  proposed,  in  Great 
Britain.  As  some  enlightened  newspapers  have 
pointed  out,  British  progressives,  with  characteris- 
tic sense  and  sobriety,  have  modified  the  Russian 
soviet  plan  and  adapted  it  to  the  institutions  and 
traditions  of  their  own  country,  whose  genius  for 
timely  compromise  and  accommodation  is  univer- 
sally admired.  It  is  no  humiliation  to  the  sovereign 


88  OUR  REVOLUTION 

Parliament  of  Britain  to  admit  that  it  often  fumbles 
and  muddles  because  it  lacks  scientific  and  practical 
knowledge,  and  because  it  is  hampered  by  partisan 
politics  and  supposed  partisan  strategy.  But,  hu- 
miliating or  not,  the  admission  that  parliaments  and 
congresses  and  legislatures  of  the  conventional  type 
have  developed  weakness  and  faults  and  require  ex- 
tensive "mending"  will  have  to  be  made.  And  it  is 
fortunate  that  sober-minded  students  of  the  problem 
are  beginning  to  develop  a  sort  of  consensus  of  opin- 
ion respecting  the  sort  of  mending  that  needs  to 
be  done.  Extreme,  superficial  notions  are  being  dis- 
carded. The  silly  demand  for  the  sudden,  imme- 
diate "sovietizing"  of  our  so-called  bourgeois  govern- 
ments on  the  Moscow,  Petrograd,  and  Budapest 
models  was  confined  to  ignorant  and  shallow  editors 
of  the  yellow  radical  press.  We  shall  hear  little 
of  that  nonsense  after  a  while,  but  we  shall  and  ought 
to  hear  much  about  genuinely  representative  legis- 
lative assemblies,  as  well  as  about  electoral  machin- 
ery and  electoral  laws  that  are  intentionally  de- 
signed to  produce  such  assemblies. 

It  is  certain  that  even  plain  business  men  who 
would  warmly  repudiate  any  charge  of  sympathy 
with  radicalism  will  increasingly  insist  on  changes 
in  the  composition,  personnel,  and  atmosphere  of 
our  legislative  bodies.  The  complaint  that  "there 
are  too  many  lawyers"  in  Congress  is  familiar  and 
symptomatic.  There  are  too  many  lawyers  in  every 


WHAT  SHALL  WE  DO  WITH  STATE?     89 

legislative  body  in  the  United  States.  Lawyers  have 
a  strong  bias  toward  legalism.  They  are  more  adept 
at  raising  objections,  drawing  fine  distinctions, 
splitting  hairs,  finding  reasons  against  proposed 
courses  of  action,  than  at  removing  difficulties  and 
making  constructive  suggestions.  The  business  man 
is  right  when  he  asserts  that  we  need,  in  public  life, 
more  men  who  know  how  to  get  results.  We  need 
farmers,  merchants,  manufacturers,  engineers,  phy- 
sicians, educators,  practical  sociologists,  mechanics, 
labor  leaders,  in  our  legislative  bodies.  This  is  in 
strict  accord  with  the  true  democratic  principle; 
there  is  nothing  wild  or  extreme  about  the  idea.  We 
shall  have  a  better  state,  a  more  efficient  and  demo- 
cratic state,  when  the  men  and  women  who  speak 
and  act  in  its  name  represent  industry,  commerce, 
science,  the  liberal  professions,  the  arts,  practical 
benevolence,  and  the  like.  That  state  will  be  as  good 
as  the  average  character,  intelligence,  and  culture 
of  the  people  can  make  it.  More  is  impossible. 

Finally,  within  the  limits  of  the  state's  proper 
activities — and,  to  repeat  with  emphasis,  to  demand 
more  democracy  is  not  to  demand  the  enthronement 
of  the  majority  and  the  abolition  of  individual  and 
minority  rights — the  voters  must  be  armed  with  ef- 
fective weapons  of  control  and  defense,  with  the  ref- 
erendum, the  initiative,  the  recall,  proportional  rep- 
resentation, as  against  their  elected  representatives. 
A  golden  mean  must  be  found  between  the  chaos  and 


90  OUR  REVOLUTION 

emotionalism  of  so-called  "pure  democracy,'*  which, 
in  truth,  has  become  impossible  in  large  and  hetero- 
geneous societies,  and  a  too  rigid  system  of  represen- 
tative government,  which  has  so  often  resulted  in 
anti-democratic,  anti-popular,  misrepresentative 
government. 

Changes  still  more  fundamental  than  those 
sketched  may  and  must  be  left  to  the  future.  It  is 
unprofitable  to  speculate  upon  their  nature,  for  the 
data  available  are  wholly  insufficient.  Mere  tech- 
nical and  mechanical  progress  may  react  powerfully 
on  the  modern  state.  The  further  development  of  a 
sane  and  sound  internationalism,  which  is  inevitable, 
cannot  fail  to  affect  the  nationalist  state.  But  such 
changes  cannot  be  foreseen  in  the  concrete;  to  pre- 
dict them  in  vague  generalities  is  not  to  facilitate 
them.  The  course  of  wisdom  and  sane,  philosophical 
radicalism  is  to  interpret  and  facilitate  such  changes 
as  are  surely  coming,  as  are  actually  casting  shad- 
ows before  them,  and  as  we  can  afford  to  encourage 
and  welcome. 


HUMAN  PROGRESS:   THE   IDEA  AND  THE 
REALITY 


WHATEVER  else  the  great  world  war  has  done,  it  is 
certain  that  in  thousands  of  sad  and  thoughtful 
homes,  the  globe  over,  some  such  questions  as  these 
have  been  asked  and  pondered:  Is  human  progress 
a  mere  illusion?  If  such  things  can  be,  what  and 
where  is  our  vaunted  culture,  our  civilization?  If 
the  terrible  and  apparently  needless  and  futile 
struggle  is  compatible  with  civilization,  and  does  not 
reduce  so-called  progress  to  a  mockery  and  sham, 
what  is  the  true  definition  of  progress  ?  Finally,  does 
a  "progress"  which  renders  such  horrors  possible,  or 
which  fails  to  prevent  or  exclude  them,  signify  or 
contain  anything  worth  while? 

It  is  doubtless  safe  to  say  that  the  sad  and  quiet 
homes  alluded  to  have  not  satisfactorily  answered 
these  grave  questions.  They 'are  anxiously  waiting 
for  light,  and  expecting  the  philosophers  and  moral- 
ists to  give  them  such  light  and  comfort,  to  renew 
their  faith  or  allay  their  painful  doubts  and  misgiv- 
ings. Some  of  the  American  and  European  philoso- 
phers have  attempted  to  grapple  with  the  questions 

91 


92  0175  REVOLUTION 


indicated;  others  have  apparently  been  too  stunned 
and  bewildered  to  venture  on  the  attempt.  The  City 
Club  of  Chicago,  conscious  of  this  situation,  con- 
ceived the  admirable  idea  of  arranging  a  scientific 
symposium  on  "Human  Progress"  for  the  benefit  of 
its  own  members  as  well  as  the  wider  public.  This 
notable  event  was  participated  in  by  Dr.  John 
Dewey,  the  eminent  American  educator  and  phi- 
losopher, Dr.  Jacob  P.  Hollander,  political  econo- 
mist, and  Professor  James  Harvey  Robinson,  of 
Columbia  University,  historian. 

II 

In  this  paper  the  views  and  conclusions  of  these 
thinkers,  and  of  some  others  will  be  summarized  and 
considered.  To  facilitate  a  better  understanding  of 
them,  however,  there  is  a  preliminary  question  of  im- 
portance and  historical  interest  that  invites  atten- 
tion —  the  question  as  to  the  evolution  and  genesis  of 
the  very  idea  or  conception  of  human  progress. 

To  many  educated  but  "general"  readers  it  will  be 
a  distinct  surprise  to  hear  that  there  is  any  pre- 
liminary question  concerning  the  idea  of  progress. 
Our  own  age  is  so  familiar  with  this  idea,  and  the 
term  is  so  cherished  a  household  possession,  that  few 
stop  to  ask  anything  regarding  its  past,  its  origin, 
and  development.  Yet,  as  Auguste  Comte  and  other 
sociologists  have  pointed  out,  the  idea  of  progress 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  93 

as  now  understood  is  not  only  modern,  but  astonish- 
ingly recent.  According  to  Comte,  it  dates  from 
Fontenelle  and  Condorcet.  Antiquity  knew  nothing 
of  the  idea.  The  seers,  innovators,  emancipators, 
reformers  of  antiquity,  Comte  contends,  merely  re- 
belled against  tradition,  authority,  and  blind  obe- 
dience. In  offering  the  world  new  truths  and  new 
principles,  however,  these  leaders  and  guides  did  not 
explicitly  affirm  any  general  idea  of  progress,  and 
hardly  so  much  as  suspected  that  such  an  idea  was 
implicit  in  their  views  and  attitudes.  To  come  to 
destroy  the  old  and  proclaim  a  new  gospel — a  revo- 
lutionary one — is  not  to  lay  down  a  "law  of  prog- 
ress." To  advocate  change  or  even  improvement  is 
not  to  imply  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  progress, 
in  the  strictly  modern  sense  of  the  term.  To  paint 
or  sigh  for  a  Utopia,  to  dream  of  a  new  heaven  and 
earth,  to  believe  that  human  nature  can  be  suddenly 
modified  and  a  social  order  revolutionized,  is  not 
necessarily  to  accept  the  conception  of  progress. 

What  is  that  conception?  In  the  words  of  M. 
Emile  Faguet,  the  French  academician,  critic,  and 
author,  to  believe  in  progress  is  to  admit  or  assert 
that  humanity  steadily,  if  slowly,  marches  toward 
the  Better,  or  the  Best — tends  toward  the  Best,  un- 
dergoes constant  improvement. 

To  be  sure,  there  are  those  who  admit  or  recognize 
reactions  or  retrogressions ;  who  believe  that  nations, 
communities,  even  the  whole  civilized  world,  may 


94  OUR  REVOLUTION 

cease  to  advance  and  even  temporarily  lapse  into 
lower,  outgrown  states,  perhaps  even  into  barbarism. 
Herbert  Spencer  and  others  were  of  the  opinion,  in 
the  late  years  of  the  last  century,  that  modern  so- 
ciety was  seriously  threatened  with  "rebarbariza- 
tion."  Governments,  parties,  labor  organizations, 
schools  of  thought,  single  philosophers,  have  been 
accused  from  time  to  time  of  preaching  and  prac- 
ticing reactionary  doctrines,  of  seeking  to  undo  the 
great  work  of  decades  or  even  of  centuries.  But 
there  is  invariably  in  these  complaints  or  indictments 
the  tacit  assumption,  if  not  the  expressed  conviction, 
that  the  reaction  is  but  temporary,  and  that  the 
march  of  humanity  toward  its  goal  will  and  must  be 
resumed  sooner  or  later. 

Thus  the  essence  of  the  modern  conception  of 
progress  is  continuity — relative,  perhaps,  rather 
than  absolute,  but  continuity — steadiness,  persist- 
ence, and  certainty.  The  conception  implies  that 
progress  is  in  a  sense  the  law  of  humanity;  that 
human  beings  as  such  tend  to  perfect  themselves,  to 
grow  and  improve  in  certain  directions  ;  that  they  are 
better  now  than  they  were  in  the  past,  and  will  be 
better  tomorrow  than  they  are  today. 

It  is  plain  that  the  shock  administered  to  us  by 
the  great  and  cruel  war — responsibility  for  which 
every  nation  is  so  eager  to  disclaim — is  directly  at- 
tributable to  this  modern  conception  of  progress. 
Even  those  of  us  who  are  prepared  for  lapses,  for 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  95 

r 

reaction  and  retrogression,  somehow  assume  that  any 
reaction  must  be  "a  little  one"  in  this  day  and  gen- 
eration. A  bad  act  of  parliament;  the  repeal  or 
emasculation  of  a  good  act ;  a  blunder  or  crime  on  the 
part  of  a  cabinet  or  diplomatic  clique;  a  "sort  of 
war"  in  some  remote  part  of  the  world;  even  a  war 
between  two  great  but  not  quite  civilized  powers — 
such  things  we  can  account  for  and  understand. 
They  do  not  militate  against  the  very  idea  of  human 
progress.  But  this  Pan-European  or  world-war,  this 
tragedy  of  blunders,  aggressions,  failures,  and 
jealousies,  of  suspicion  and  fears  and  alarms,  we 
cannot,  at  least  at  this  time,  bring  ourselves  to  re- 
gard as  nothing  more  than  lapse,  an  exception  to 
the  rule  of  human  life.  We  sorrowfully  say  to  our- 
selves that  if  this  be  an  "exception,"  the  alleged  rule 
itself  would  seem  to  be  valueless  and  a  piece  of  bitter 
irony.  Some  thinkers  are  so  buried  in  gloom  and 
pessimism  that  they  are  led  to  dispute  the  modern 
idea  of  progress  and  to  hark  back  to  the  ancients. 
Others  feel  that  the  time  for  rational  and  sober  con- 
clusions has  not  come  and  therefore  deliberately  lay 
the  whole  question  aside,  to  be  taken  up  a  decade 
hence,  perhaps. 

Without  speculating  on  the  probable  results  of 
future  controversies,  however,  deep  interest  is  felt 
in  many  circles  in  the  views  expressed  today  by 
earnest,  informed,  and  cultivated  persons  concerning 
the  nature  and  meaning  of  progress. 


96  OUR  REVOLUTION 

M.  Faguet,  the  eminent  Frenchman  already 
quoted,  in  an  article  or  critical  review  of  a  work  en- 
titled L'Histoire  de  Videe  de  progres,  by  Jules  Del- 
vaille,  a  compatriot  of  his,  treated  the  subject  in  a 
fresh,  candid,  and  thought-provoking  manner.  The 
article  was  contributed  to  the  Paris  magazine,  La 
Revue,  in  April,  1913,  and  we  may  feel  sure  that  the 
author,  in  view  of  the  things  that  have  happened  to 
France, — wistful,  pathetic  France — since  that  time, 
has  not  revised  his  somewhat  depressing  conclusions. 
M.  Faguet's  method  of  treatment  is  so  clear  and  in- 
telligent that  the  final  pages  of  his  paper  amply 
deserve,  and  will  repay,  reproduction  in  a  rather 
free  translation.  Such  a  translation  follows : 

What  do  I  think  of  the  theory  of  progress  taken 
by  itself  and  as  it  stands — the  theory  of  continu- 
ous, or  almost  continuous,  improvement?  I  think  it 
is  absurd  by  its  very  definition.  To  know  whether 
anyone  is  advancing  toward  a  goal,  it  is  necessary  to 
know  whither  he  is  going.  If  you  see  a  man  walking 
along  a  route  toward  a  point  A,  and  getting  farther 
and  father  away  from  a  point  B,  you  do  not  know 
whether  he  is  progressing  or  retrogressing  until  you 
find  out  whether  his  object  is  A  or  B.  If  you  do  not 
know  that,  all  you  can  state  is  one  thing — that  he  is 
changing  his  place.  Hence,  to  know  whether  hu- 
manity is  progressing  or  retrogressing,  it  would  be 
necessary  to  know  what  its  goal  is,  its  true  and 
real  goal — and  also  whether  it  is  or  is  not  deceiving 
itself  regarding  that  veritable  goal.  But  we  do  not 
know  which  is  the  real  goal  of  humanity,  and  conse- 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  97 

quently  we  do  not  know  whether  it  is  advancing*  or 
retrogressing;  we  know  only  that  it  is  moving. 

Only  a  man  placed  at  the  extreme  end  of  humanity 
and  in  possession  of  full  knowledge  as  to  the  ways 
traversed  by  it  would  be  able  to  tell,  comparing  its 
point  of  departure  with  its  point  of  arrival,  that 
it  has  marched  from  improvement  to  improvement; 
or  that  it  has  advanced  with  numerous  digressions 
and  retrogressions ;  or  that  it  has  deceived  itself  all 
along.  But  a  man  living  in  an  indeterminate  epoch 
of  history,  in  the  sense  that  one  does  not  know 
whether  the  epoch  is  nearer  the  end  or  the  beginning 
of  history — such  a  man  has  no  illumination  on  this 
question  of  universal  history,  and  lacks  sense  even  if 
he  puts  such  a  question. 

However,  not  to  take  things  too  abstractly,  sup- 
pose we  ask  ourselves  simply  whether  humanity  is  in 
a  better  state  than  formerly;  have  we  not  sufficient 
historical  knowledge  to  answer — and  to  answer 
"Yes"?  This  depends  on  the  point  of  view.  Is  hu- 
manity greater  than  formerly  by  reason  of  its  su- 
perior art?  The  adherents  of  the  theory  of  progress 
are  bent  on  proving  this  to  be  the  case,  but  they  are 
actually  at  their  weakest  in  this  line  of  demonstra- 
tion. Is  humanity  happier?  We  do  not  know;  for 
if  there  be  one  incontestable  thing,  it  is  that  man 
advances  in  happiness,  or  in  capacity  for  happiness 
and  therefore  in  happiness,  to  the  extent  to  which  he 
advances  in  morality.  But,  are  you  quite  sure  of 
moral  progress  ?  There  it  is  that  we  see  waves,  crises 
followed  by  formidable  retrogressions.  Nothing,  in 
fact,  is  less  certain  than  moral  progress  through  the 
ages. 

Does    humanity    know    more?    Well,    humanity 


98  OUR  REVOLUTION 

knows  more,  but  man  knows  less.  Humanity  has 
amassed  an  enormous  sum  of  knowledge,  but  the 
most  learned  knows  but  a  small  part  of  that  knowl- 
edge, and  every  man  is  relatively  more  ignorant  than 
he  was  in  ancient  times,  when  there  was  less  to  know. 
Man  is  grand,  but  men  are  small ;  every  man  is  small 
and  ignorant ;  this  is  tantamount  to  saying  that  Man 
knows  nothing. 

If  we  regard  knowledge  as  an  instrument  or  means 
of  forming  general  ideas,  and  as  a  source  of  inex- 
haustible pleasure  to  him  who  knows,  we  still  find  that 
the  most  ancient  of  ancients  had  a  host  of  general 
ideas  that  satisfied  them  and  that  we  cannot  see  were 
so  miserably  inferior  to  our  general  ideas.  As  for 
the  pleasure,  the  joy,  of  knowledge,  the  most  ancient 
of  ancients  had  enough  knowledge  to  give  each  of 
them  pleasure  during  the  course  of  a  long  life. 

But  the  question  of  happiness  persists  in  re- 
turning. Does  not  science  contribute  to  morality; 
and  if  there  is  more  science,  there  must  be  more  mor- 
ality and  therefore  more  happiness? 

Does  science  contribute  to  morality  ?  If  we  have  in 
mind  the  science  or  knowledge  possessed  by  the  in- 
dividual, it  may  be  admitted  that  very  often  the  edu- 
cated man  is  more  moral  than  the  ignorant ;  but  the 
truth  is,  the  educated  man  is  more  educated  just  be- 
cause he  is  more  moral,  and  not  more  moral  because 
he  is  more  educated.  There  are  but  two  classes  of  in- 
structed men:  those  who  acquire  education  because 
they  wish  to  "arrive,"  because  it  is  a  means  of  ma- 
terial success,  and  those  who  educate  themselves  out 
of  pure  love  of  knowledge.  The  former  are  merely 
ambitious  and  worldly,  and  knowledge  does  not  give 
them  superior  or  higher  morality  than  the  morality 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  99 

with  which  they  start.  The  others,  who  educate 
themselves,  not  because  of  their  desire  to  prosper  and 
succeed,  not  from  vanity  or  greed,  not  from  love  of 
power,  but  out  of  pure,  disinterested  love  of  knowl- 
edge, these  are  evidently  moral  at  the  outset;  they 
were  born  moral,  so  to  speak.  It  is  their  morality 
that  impelled  them  to  acquire  knowledge.  If  they 
had  not  been  able  to  acquire  knowledge  they  would 
have  been  peasants  or  workmen  of  that  strict  integ- 
rity, that  high  morality,  that  profound  virtue,  which 
sometimes  astonish  and  humiliate  us — peasants  or 
workmen  that  belong  to  the  elite  of  humanity;  since 
it  hardly  needs  saying  that  the  elite  is  not  restricted 
to  any  class,  and  that  there  are  princes  of  humanity 
even  among  the  illiterate  and  the  ignorant.  As  for 
the  general  spread  of  knowledge  and  literacy  among 
the  masses,  in  France  the  number  of  crimes  commit- 
ted has  doubled  since  the  introduction  of  universal 
and  compulsory  instruction.  The  connection  between 
knowledge  and  morality  has  not  been  demonstrated 
at  all  and  is  more  than  doubtful. 

What,  then,  becomes  of  the  hypothesis  of  prog- 
ress? Artistic  progress  is  non-existent;  scientific 
progress  is  a  fact,  but  it  is  a  progress  that  neutral- 
izes itself  in  the  process ;  moral  progress,  the  only 
thing  that  matters,  if  we  consider  human  happiness 
to  be  our  true  end,  would  exist  if  scientific  progress 
had  any  perceptible  influence  on  morals — but  that  is 
a  proposition  that  has  not  been  demonstrated. 

M.  Faguet  concludes  that  the  theory  of  continuous 
and  uninterrupted  human  progress  is  a  sheer  delu- 
sion, a  prejudice,  not  only  useless,  but  dangerous.  It 
is  a  dangerous  prejudice  or  notion  because,  M. 


100  OUR  REVOLUTION 

Faguet  argues,  it  begets  indifference,  inaction,  fa- 
talism. It  is  just  as  bad  and  paralyzing  as  the  be- 
lief that  things  are  going  from  bad  to  worse  and 
that  no  human  effort  is  of  any  avail,  or  as  the  belief 
that,  by  a  sort  of  law  of  compensation,  things  always 
remain  the  same,  and  that  no  change  that  takes  place 
affects  anything  vital  or  fundamental  in  human  na- 
ture and  conduct.  For  if  progress  is  assured,  if  it 
be  a  law  of  humanity,  if  it  is  automatic  or  spon- 
taneous, why  toil  and  suffer  and  make  sacrifices? 

What,  then,  we  should  believe  in,  and  what  we  have 
evidence  to  support,  is  the  modest,  unsensational  doc- 
trine that  in  certain  directions  improvements  and 
ameliorations  are  possible.  We  should,  in  other 
words,  believe  in  certain  kinds  of  progress,  but  not  in 
progress.  We  have  a  passion  for  effort,  a  mania  for 
invention,  and  this  is  largely  the  cause  of  our  zest 
for  life,  our  joy  in  life.  "Inventionism"  is  not  neces- 
sarily good  for  us ;  it  does  not  necessarily  make  for 
happiness,  but  it  seems  to  be  a  law  of  our  being. 
Some  of  the  things  we  regard  as  progressive  are 
not  progressive  at  all,  but  humanity  is  like  a  sick  man 
who  seeks  relief  in  turning  from  side  to  side,  or 
from  side  to  back.  The  relief  is  temporary,  but  it  is 
real  relief  for  the  time  being.  At  any  rate,  if  not  all 
change  is  progress,  some  change  is,  and  to  believe  in 
amelioration  and  improvement  is  to  have  a  motive 
for  effort  and  action. 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  101 

IV 

M.  Faguet's  views  are  not  very  cheerful,  as  we 
see.  Even  the  admission  he  finally  makes  is  made 
grudgingly  and  with  reserve.  Some  advance,  some 
improvement,  in  certain  directions  he  declares  to  be 
possible.  This  may  be  sufficient  basis  for  various  re- 
form movements  and  liberal  or  radical  schools  or 
parties.  But  it  cannot  excite  enthusiasm  or  zeal. 
Such  a  conception  of  progress  in  society  and  human- 
ity may  give  us  patient,  useful  workers,  but  it  will 
not  give  us  inspired  and  inspiring  leaders,  martyrs, 
generous  and  noble  pioneers.  Of  course,  if  the  con- 
ception in  question  is  the  best  that  science  and  ex- 
perience will  warrant,  it  is  idle  to  complain.  But  is 
it  the  best  thing  we  can  hope  for?  Is  M.  Faguet  as 
scientific  as  he  is  sobering  and  dispiriting? 

Dr.  John  Dewey,  in  his  contribution  to  the  City 
Club  symposium  above  mentioned,  had  more  to  offer 
us.  He  shares  some  of  the  negative  views  of  Faguet, 
it  seems.  He  believes  that  we  have  been  far  too  shal- 
low and  complacent  in  our  notions  of  progress,  as- 
suming that  it  is  all  but  irrepressible  and  inevitable ; 
that  we  have  attributed  human  progress  to  Provi- 
dence, or  Evolution,  or  the  Nature  of  Things,  and 
have  mistaken  change,  and  especially  rapidity  of 
change,  for  wonderful  progress.  He  holds  that  the 
technical,  scientific,  and  material  advances  of  the 


L13RAit  i 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIF! 
SANTA  BARUA1U 


102  OUR  REVOLUTION 

last  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  have  merely  pro- 
vided opportunity  for  progress  in  the  true  sense  of 
the  term,  instead  of  representing  or  being  progress 
itself. 

Progress,  according  to  Dr.  Dewey,  is  a  human  task 
and  a  "retail  job"  at  that.  It  is  by  no  means  a  fore- 
gone conclusion.  It  is  possible,  but  it  is  only  possible 
under  certain  conditions,  and  these  conditions  are 
not  all  material  and  technical.  They  include  "hard 
wishing,"  constant  planning  and  contriving,  the  ex- 
ercise of  foresight,  the  devising  and  adopting  of 
means,  laws,  methods,  and  social  arrangements.  Hu- 
manity has  now  the  technique,  the  method,  the  re- 
sources and  facilities  that  are  demanded  by  what  we 
call  progress,  but  it  cannot  have  progress  unless  it 
deliberately  goes  to  work  to  insure  it.  Humanity  has 
the  intelligence  as  well  as  the  sentiments  and  emo- 
tions that  are  requisite  to  progress.  While  we  have 
predatory  and  malevolent  feeling  and  instincts,  and 
while  the  sum  total  of  these  anti-social  and  selfish 
sentiments  is  great  enough  to  keep  any  person,  any 
group,  any  nation,  any  alliance  of  nations,  in  per- 
petual trouble,  at  war  with  others,  it  is  equally 
true  that  we  haye  sufficient  benevolence,  kindliness, 
justice,  and  tenderness  to  give  us  peace  and  neigh- 
bo  rliness  and  brotherhood,  just  and  equitable  ar- 
rangements, if  we  but  make  proper  use  of  this  part 
of  our  endowment,  our  assets. 

Progress,  according  to  Dr.  Dewey,  is  not  a  matter 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  103 

of  intelligence  generally,  and  still  is  it  a  matter  of 
emotion,  of  so-called  altruism  and  good-will.  We 
may  have  plenty  of  intelligence  and  of  right  feeling 
without  being  progressive  or  doing  anything  for 
progress.  We  may  use  our  intelligence  destructively 
or  in  entire  indifference  to  progress.  We  may  stifle 
or  neglect  our  right  feeling  and  cultivate  the  wrong 
sentiments  and  emotions,  those  that  breed  discord 
and  enmity.  What  progress  depends  on,  what  it  pre- 
supposes, is  the  systematic  thinking  and  planning 
of  progress.  If  we  want  justice,  for  example,  we 
must  carefully  think  out  and  enact  laws  designed  to 
give  us  just  decisions;  and  we  must  establish  courts 
and  other  agencies  that  could  be  trusted  rightly  to 
interpret  and  enforce  the  laws  passed  in  the  interest 
of  justice.  If  we  want  conciliation  and  arbitration, 
industrial  or  other,  we  must  establish  the  proper 
agencies  and  arrangements  for  that  end  and  object. 
If  we  want  a  certain  amount  of  internationalism,  we 
must  establish  certain  useful,  vital,  and  vigorous  in- 
ternational agencies  that  will  not  only  exemplify  and 
further  internationalism,  but  that  will  make  interna- 
tionalism serviceable  and  interesting  to  powerful 
groups  of  persons. 

Dr.  Dewey  did  not  provide  any  exact  definition 
of  progress  in  his  brilliant  paper  at  the  City  Club. 
But,  of  course,  it  implied  a  clear  definition  through- 
out. By  progress  Dr.  Dewey  meant  national  and 
international  peace,  concord,  justice,  as  well  as  so- 


104  OUR  REVOLUTION 

cial  justice  and  equality  of  opportunity  in  every 
direction.  His  views,  therefore,  may  be  summed  up 
thus:  If  we  want  equality  of  opportunity,  freedom, 
justice,  reasonable  comfort  for  all,  and  intellectual 
and  spiritual  joys  for  all,  we  must  do  exactly  what 
men  of  physical  science  do  when  they  have  certain 
problems  to  solve:  We  must  think  earnestly  and 
long;  we  must  experiment,  plan,  observe,  compare, 
rearrange,  restudy,  experiment  again,  until  we  obtain 
the  result  desired.  Progress  may  not  be  ours  for  the 
asking,  but  it  is  ours  for  the  working.  Vigorous  and 
constant  contriving  and  planning  of  progress  is  what 
will  give  us  progress.  Notoriously,  the  modern  world 
has  not  done  any  such  planning  and  contriving. 
Hence  the  lamentable  and  melancholy  spectacle  in 
Europe.  Hence  other  lamentable  and  discreditable 
spectacles — undeserved  misery,  widespread  want  in 
the  midst  of  abundance,  involuntary  idleness  of 
armies  of  men  eager  and  able  to  earn  a  living,  degra- 
dation and  delinquency  due  to  lack  of  vocational 
training  and  fair  opportunity,  and  the  like.  If  the 
great  war  has  shocked  us,  it  has  also  brought  home 
to  us  the  truth  that  progress  must  be  planned  and 
worked  for,  not  taken  for  granted.  Even  the  war  is 
not  too  great  a  price  to  pay  for  this  awakening,  this 
discovery.  Even  the  war,  on  the  other  hand,  dis- 
couraging as  it  is,  does  not  disprove  the  possibility, 
or  even  the  certainty,  of  progress,  provided  men 
want  it  and  are  willing  to  contrive  and  work  for  it. 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  105 

The  difference  between  Dr.  Dewey's  view  and  that 
of  Faguet  is  this,  then — the  latter  expects  little 
progress  at  the  best,  while  the  former  leaves  both  the 
quality  and  the  quantity  of  progress  in  our  own 
hands,  so  to  speak.  He  assigns  no  limits  and  thinks 
none  assignable  from  any  reasonable  point  of  view. 
Dr.  Dewey's  message  is  one  of  hope  and  cheer,  but 
also  one  of  action  and  work. 

It  may  be  added  here  that  Professors  Hollander 
and  Robinson,  each  from  his  special  angle,  confirmed 
and  indorsed  this  message.  Professor  Hollander,  as 
an  economist,  expressed  his  conviction  that  poverty 
and  socially  created  want  can  be  abolished,  and  that 
the  means  and  agencies  of  reform  are  at  hand.  Pro- 
fessor Robinson,  as  a  student  of  history,  declared  his 
conviction  that  culture  and  civilization  are  so  unique 
and  so  purely  human  that  we  need  draw  no  disheart- 
ening "biological"  parallels ;  that  we  have  it  in  our 
power  to  improve  social  and  economic  and  political 
relations  "at  will,"  and  that  our  failures  and  lapses 
are  due  to  intellectual  indolence,  to  superstition  and 
blind  reverence  for  tradition  and  authority,  to  er- 
roneous notions  of  "human  nature"  and  human 
destiny. 


Now,  while  such  conclusions  as  there  are  cheering 
and  revivifying,  they  leave  one  very  important  ques- 


106  OUR  REVOLUTION 

tion  unconsidered  and  unanswered.  We  can  easily 
imagine  thinkers  like  Faguet  putting  this  question  as 
a  veritable  "poser"  to  Dr.  Dewey  and  his  adherents. 
It  is  this:  If  progress  is  "a  retail  job"  to  be  success- 
fully performed  by  patient  and  infinite  toil,  by  hard 
thinking  and  contriving,  why  should  the  selfish,  the 
comfortable,  the  powerful,  the  secure,  the  happy, 
wish  it  hard  and  work  for  it  even  harder?  If  prog- 
ress is  not  a  law  of  humanity — if  we  must,  as  it  were, 
bargain  and  contract  for  it — to  what  elements  or 
properties  of  human  mind  and  nature  are  we  to 
address  our  demand  or  prayer  for  cooperation  in 
the  cause  of  progress  ?  What  inducements  have  we  to 
offer  them?  The  contractor  works  for  profit;  if  we 
wish  to  contract  for  progress,  what  profit  can  we 
promise  to  those  who  are  well  off  here  and  now? 
Shall  we  appeal  to  their  sense  of  expediency?  Shall 
we  tell  them  that  they  would  be  happier  and  safer 
than  they  are  under  a  regime  of  progress?  M. 
Faguet  would  smile  at  a  suggestion  of  this  sort; 
there  are  hundred  of  thousands  who  would  not  re- 
spond to  any  argument  from  expediency.  They  live 
in  the  present  and  care  little  about  their  grand- 
children or  more  remote  posterity;  they  will  tell  us 
that  the  existing  order  is  certain  to  outlive  them  and 
those  that  are  dear  to  them,  and  that  there  is  no 
earthly  reason  why  they  should  work  hard  for  social 
progress,  for  the  welfare  of  others.  Shall  we  appeal 
to  the  sense  of  justice,  of  sympathy,  of  generosity? 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  107 

Shall  we  argue  that  there  is  a  great  joy  and  satis- 
faction in  well-doing,  in  service,  in  disinterested  la- 
bor, and  that  the  promotion  and  realization  of  prog- 
ress will  be  its  own  reward?  Shall  we,  in  short, 
appeal  to  the  altruistic  sentiments  and  emotions  ?  If 
so,  and  if  we  expect  our  appeal  to  be  successful, 
what  is  the  necessary  implication?  Clearly,  the  im- 
plication is  that  the  altruistic  sentiments  are 
stronger  than  the  egoistic  ones,  and  that  even  the 
selfish,  the  callous,  the  indifferent,  the  beneficiaries 
of  unjust  privileges  or  accidental  good  fortune,  may 
be  aroused  and  stirred  to  action  by  tales  or  pictures 
of  suffering,  of  want,  of  inhumanity,  of  avoidable 
degradation  and  degeneration.  And  if  we  admit  that 
this  is  the  implication  of  the  appeal,  do  we  not  admit, 
in  reality,  that  man  is  distinguished  Toy  his  altruism, 
by  his  sentiments  of  justice  and  beneficence?  And, 
finally,  if  we  admit  this,  do  we  not  admit  that  prog- 
ress is  the  law  of  human  nature?  If  we  can  have 
progress  by  appealing  to  altruism  because  altruism 
is  stronger  than  egoism,  then  progress  is  a  law  of 
our  being,  since  it  is  inconceivable  that  the  appeals 
in  behalf  of  progress  and  of  altruism — and  to  altru- 
ism— should  ever  be  suspended  for  any  considerable 
period. 

To  say  that  the  appeal  is  not  to  altruism,  to  the 
sentiment  of  justice  and  generosity,  is  to  say  that 
there  is  nothing  to  appeal  to,  for  there  is  no  third 
set  of  qualities  in  human  nature.  If  enlightened 


108  OUR  REVOLUTION 

self-interest  or  expediency  is  insufficient,  and  if  al- 
truism is  also  insufficient,  then  M.  Faguet  is  right, 
and  we  need  expect  no  very  great  advance  in  any  di- 
rection save  that  of  material  prosperity  and  me- 
chanical invention.  A  little  social  or  moral  improve- 
ment may,  indeed,  be  expected  as  a  mere  by-product 
of  such  progress,  but  in  such  a  by-product  there  is 
little  to  glorify. 

The  Spencerian  evolutionist,  it  may  here  be 
pointed  out,  regards  the  questions  just  discussed  as 
unanswerable  from  the  viewpoint  of  strict  utili- 
tarians or  pure  intellectualists.  He  holds  that  the 
only  basis  for  a  rational  theory  of  progress  is  the 
doctrine  that  social  development  and  social  disci- 
pline have  steadily  strengthened  and  are  steadily 
strengthening  our  sentiments  of  justice  and  benefi- 
cence; that,  although' altruism  is  as  primordial  as 
egoism,  and  is  by  no  means  confined  to  man,  it  is  not 
a  fixed  quantity,  and  that  human  progress  depends 
on  the  growth  and  intensification  of  our  altruistic 
sentiments.  He  holds  that  what  we  call  character 
and  goodness  are  the  highest  and  finest  products  of 
evolution,  and  that  intelligence  and  knowledge  are 
only  tools  and  instruments  used  by  the  emotions  and 
the  will  of  humanity.  If  the  Spencerian  evolutionist 
is  right,  progress  may  be  said  to  be  a  law  of  our 
being,  albeit  education  and  environmental  influences 
are  extremely  important. 

But  if  we  deny  that  altruism  is  and  has  long  been 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  109 

increasing,  and  if  we  assert  that  there  is  no  more 
evidence  of  any  increase  in  innate  altruism  in  a  hun- 
dred thousand  years  than  there  is  of  an  increase  in 
the  mental  power  and  capacity  of  man  in  the  last  six 
or  seven  thousand  years,  then  the  burden  of  proof 
falls  on  us  and  we  must  demonstrate  by  reference 
to  history  and  to  contemporary  experience  that, 
weak  and  frail  as  we  are,  divided  against  ourselves 
as  we  are,  sadly  deficient  as  we  are  in  qualities  we 
deem  admirable,  the  amount  of  right  thinking  and 
right  feeling  in  us  is,  and  long  has  been,  quite  suffi- 
cient to  assure  progress  if  we  but  take  the  necessary 
pains  with  it  and  deliberately  make  it  our  object 
and  goal.  Can  we  sustain  this  burden  of  proof?  Is 
the  proposition  demonstrable?  Can  it  be  shown  that 
"we  have  as  much  progress  as  we  deserve" ;  that  we 
have  always  had  as  much  progress  as  we  "bargained 
for,"  worked  for,  sought,  in  a  "retail  way,"  to 
achieve  and  nail  down,  as  it  were? 

Let  us  see  to  what  lame  and  impotent  conclusion  a 
great  naturalist  and  biologist — Alfred  Russel  Wal- 
lace— was  finally  brought  by  his  disbelief  in  the  in- 
heritance of  acquired  traits,  his  assertion  that  na- 
tural selection  and  sexual  selection  are  the  only  ac- 
tual factors  of  evolution. 

Wallace,  as  his  last  books  show,  believed  that  "our 
whole  system  of  society  is  rotten  from  top  to  bot- 
tom," and  that  "the  social  environment  as  a  whole, 
in  relation  to  our  possibilities  and  our  claims,  is  the 


110  OUR  REVOLUTION 

worst  that  the  world  has  ever  known."  He  ascribed 
the  rottenness  of  modern  society  to  the  competitive 
regime  and  to  the  failure  of  governments  to  substi- 
tute cooperation  for  competition.  He  also  recog- 
nized the  fact  that  the  so-called  competitive  regime 
is  only  competitive  in  part;  that  many  monopolies 
and  special  privileges  enjoyed  by  the  few  render  the 
field  far  from  free  or  fair,  and  that  equality  of  op- 
portunity is  the  first  condition  of  really  legitimate 
and  fair  competition.  His  remedy  for  our  ills  may  be 
stated  in  one  word,  "cooperation."  By  cooperation 
he  meant  "economic  brotherhood,"  industrial  democ- 
racy, freedom  of  access  to  land  and  capital  by  all, 
under  capable  direction. 

Of  course,  Wallace  could  not  and  did  not  ignore 
the  question  which  such  views  inevitably  suggest — 
how,  if  society  is  appallingly  rotten  and  things  are 
going  from  bad  to  worse,  we  can  expect  to  change  our 
immoral  environment  into  a  moral  one  and  to  initi- 
ate an  era  of  sound  and  healthy  progress.  That  is, 
to  whom  and  to  what  are  those  of  us  who  are  dis- 
satisfied and  restive  to  appeal  in  the  name  of  prog- 
ress ? 

Wallace's  answer,  however,  was  so  strangely  and 
singularly  superficial  and  unscientific  that  it  has 
puzzled  many  of  his  admirers.  It  amounts  to  this 
— that  in  the  first  place,  "the  more  intelligent  of  the 
workers"  are  now  prepared  to  attack  the  root- 
causes  of  our  social  and  economic  ills  and  to  demand 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  111 

the  appropriate  remedies,  and  that,  in  the  second 
place,  the  creation  of  a  new  and  moral  environment 
through  cooperation  and  social  justice  will  release 
certain  purely  natural  and  biological  forces,  now 
dormant,  that  make  for  human  improvement  and 
progress — the  forces,  namely,  of  sexual  selection. 
Today  woman  is  not  free  to  choose ;  the  emancipated 
and  independent  woman  of  the  cooperative  order  will 
refuse  to  marry  the  ugly,  the  mean,  the  brutal,  and 
the  anti-social  man,  and  her  rejection  of  the  unfit 
will  gradually  lead  to  the  selection  and  further  im- 
provement of  the  morally  fit. 

It  is  not  in  the  least  necessary  to  discuss  the 
claims  and  hopes  based  by  Wallace  on  sexual  selec- 
tion, for  he  tells  us  himself  that  this  factor  is  inop- 
erative at  present  and  will  come  into  play  only  after 
the  creation  of  a  new  and  moral  environment.  Wom- 
an, when  free,  will  do  this  or  that;  but  only  a  coop- 
erative and  just  regime  will  free  woman,  and  our 
problem  is  how  to  abolish  the  preesnt  regime  and 
usher  in  the  new  one.  Here  sexual  selection  will  not 
help  us,  and  we  are  left  with  nothing  save  the  fact 
that,  in  the  words  of  Wallace,  "the  more  intelligent 
of  the  workers"  realize  the  evils  of  monopoly  and 
wage-slavery,  and  are  ready,  or  almost  ready,  to 
fight  resolutely  for  equality  of  opportunity  and 
cooperation. 

Verily,  the  mountain  has  labored  and  has  brought 
forth  a  mouse !  That  some  intelligent  workers  favor 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

cooperation  is  true  and  of  good  augury;  but  if  all 
our  hope  of  reform  and  progress  rests  on  that  fact, 
and  that  fact  alone,  the  social  and  economic  outlook 
is  dismal  indeed.  How  long  will  it  take  to  convert 
the  millions  of  the  "less  intelligent  workers"?  And 
are  we  sure  that  the  conversion  of  even  a  decided  ma- 
jority of  the  workers  would  suffice?  Are  we  reduced 
to  the  class  struggle  and  the  class  consciousness 
again,  and  after  all?  And  what  would  Wallace  have 
said  about  the  collapse  of  the  class  struggle  and  of 
international  socialism  in  Europe  as  a  feature  of  the 
great  war? 

The  truth  is  that  those  who  deny  that  the  altruis- 
tic sentiments  are  developing  and  growing  stronger 
as  the  result  of  social  discipline  and  adaptation  to 
the  social  state,  those  who  base  their  hopes  of  prog- 
ress on  intelligence  alone,  are  left  with  broken  reeds 
to  lean  on  after  an  analysis  of  the  whole  situation 
and  the  various  factors  involved. 

Fortunately,  not  all  thinkers  reject  the  theory 
of  the  transmission  of  acquired  psychological  traits, 
of  the  inheritance  of  the  effects  of  education,  cul- 
ture, and  social  discipline;  not  all  thinkers  reject  the 
doctrine  of  the  continued  adaptability  of  mankind 
and  the  growth  of  the  altruistic  sentiments.  The 
belief  in  human  progress  rests  on  something  more 
than  class  interest,  on  something  more  than  the  ideas 
of  "the  more  intelligent  workers,"  on  something  more 
than  the  existence  of  scientific  method  and  technique, 


HUMAN  PROGRESS  113 

on  something  more  than  the  possibility  of  more  sys- 
tematic planning  and  contriving  of  certain  desid- 
erata in  social,  economic,  and  political  arrange- 
ments. All  these  are  factors,  no  doubt,  but  the 
greatest  factor  is  the  growing  sentiment  of  justice. 
Progress  is  a  resultant  of  several  forces. 

Illustrations  of  this  truth  abound.  Slavery  was 
not  abolished  in  the  United  States  by  any  single 
set  of  influences.  Self-interest,  reason,  emotion,  mili- 
tary necessity — all  these  conspired  to  bring  about 
the  step — certainly  a  progressive  step.  Industrial 
cooperation  is  progress,  but  it  is  clear  that  it  will 
not  displace  the  wage-system  and  capitalism  solely 
because  of  the  "intelligence  of  some  of  the  workmen." 
Prison  reform,  the  abolition  of  the  capital  penalty, 
and  like  improvements  are  slowly  being  realized 
largely  by  reason  of  successful  appeals  to  and  stimu- 
lation of  the  altruistic  sentiments.  On  the  other 
hand,  for  some  proposed  reforms  we  say  that  "the 
time  is  not  ripe,"  or  the  average  human  being  "is  not 
ready."  We  imply  that  at  some  future  time  the 
average  human  being  will  be  prepared  to  accept  the 
now  "utopian"  proposal.  We  expect  that  events,  ex- 
perience, and  propaganda  will  educate  him — educate 
him  not  intellectually  alone,  but  emotionally  as  well. 
If,  however,  we  can  purify  and  refine  human  emotion, 
do  we  not  thereby  facilitate  progress,  render  it  less 
difficult  for  the  future? 

Progress  is  not  automatic,  to  be  sure.     Changes 


114  OUR  REVOLUTION 

are  effected  in  time,  not  by  time,  as  Morley  said 
long  ago.  If  humanity  went  to  sleep  for  a  century 
there  would  be  no  progress.  Progress,  as  Dr.  Dewey 
holds,  is  a  retail  job,  to  be  bargained  for  and  care- 
fully planned.  But  if  we  are  to  enlist  the  hosts  of 
the  indifferent  and  the  prosperous,  the  doubting  and 
the  hostile;  if  we  are  to  treat  progress  as  a  human 
and  not  as  a  class  problem  and  task,  our  appeal 
must  be  increasingly  to,  the  best  qualities  of  our 
evolving  and  improving  human  nature. 

The  war  has  been  a  bitter  dose  to  swallow.  We 
must  revise  a  good  many  particular  opinions,  but 
we  shall  find  ere  long  that  even  the  terrible  war  has 
not  seriously  shaken  the  profound  belief  in  progress. 
For  are  not  thoughtful  men  and  women  already  say- 
ing that  the  war  itself  may  become  a  potent  instru- 
ment of  progress?  Are  we  not  already  planning 
better  peace  and  arbitration. machinery,  greater  pub- 
licity for  and  democratic  control  of  diplomacy,  and 
other  safeguards  and  preventives  of  war?  Out  of 
evil  good  may  come — nay  must  come.  Human  na- 
ture, derided  and  condemned  by  many,  will  attend  to 
that  operation. 


RECENT  ASSAULTS  ON  DEMOCRACY 

PARAPHRASING  the  words  of  a  British  liberal 
statesman,  who,  in  defending  certain  so-called  pater- 
nalistic and  restrictive  measures,  exclaimed:  "We 
are  all  Socialists  now,"  one  may  say  today,  in  view 
of  prevailing  political  and  social  tendencies,  "We 
are  all  radicals  and  democrats  now."  Few  thinkers 
of  note  venture  to  espouse  the  cause  of  caste,  class, 
privilege,  hereditary  aristocracy  or  hereditary  mon- 
archy in  any  form.  Democracy  is  triumphant,  al- 
though the  struggle  is  by  no  means  over  in  the 
practical  realm.  There  are,  of  course,  all  sorts  of 
survivals,  vestiges,  anachronisms,  to  get  rid  of — such 
as  thrones,  non-elective  second  chambers,  meaning- 
less titles,  of  nobility,  alien  governments  over  depen- 
dencies or  possessions,  and  the  like.  All  recognize, 
however,  that  these  things  "must  go"  and  are  slowly 
going,  and  that  the  future  belongs  to  a  regime  of 
pure  democracy. 

It  is  true  that  certain  vestiges  are  regarded  as 
harmless  and  rather  decorative,  and  even  the  mili- 
tant democratic  radicals  are  willing  to  spare  them 
for  the  time  being.  The  British  crown  is  an  ex- 
ample. There  is  no  formidable  republican  movement 

115 


116  OUR  REVOLUTION 

in  Great  Britain.  Stanch  leaders  of  the  labor  and 
the  advanced  liberal  parties  carefully  refrain  from 
attacking  the  monarchy,  while  fully  realizing  its 
undemocratic  character.  Still,  the  monarch  is  tol- 
erated because,  as  the  argument  runs,  while  a  good 
and  enlightened  king  or  queen  has  large  opportuni- 
ties of  real  usefulness,  a  reactionary  or  despotic 
king  or  queen  is  shorn  of  all  possibility  of  inflicting 
mischief  on  the  nation.  The  people  rule,  as  a  mat- 
ter of  fact,  and  the  crown  is  preserved  for  its  his- 
toric, sentimental,  artistic  values.  Democracies  are 
human,  it  is  explained,  and  are  fond  of  symbolism, 
ceremonial  and  pomp.  Knowing  that  their  rights 
and  liberties  are  perfectly  safe,  they  are  willing  to 
retain  an  ornamental  institution  that  links  the  pres- 
ent to  the  romantic  and  gorgeous  past. 

This  view  is  doubtless  superficial  and  unsound. 
The  British  monarchy  is  not  harmless.  The  fact 
that  the  crown's  veto  is  almost  a  forgotten  thing  of 
a  forgotten  past  blinds  many  democrats  and  pro- 
gressives to  the  insidious  and  pernicious  influences 
of  court  life,  manners  and  pretensions.  The  crown 
presupposes  caste,  class,  artificial  distinctions  and 
vanities.  These  in  turn  imply  snobbery,  servility, 
and  social  inequalities  having  no  relation  whatever 
to  personal  merits  or  social  values.  Democracy 
cannot  flourish  in  a  soil  and  atmosphere  so  poisoned. 
Democracy  needs  the  healthy  air  of  honesty,  candor, 
dignity,  self-respect  and  appreciation  of  genuine 


RECENT  ASSAULTS  ON  DEMOCRACY  117 

merit  in  all  human  relations.  But,  be  this  as  it 
may,  the  evolutionist  finds  little  difficulty  in  ac- 
counting for  the  indifference  of  British  democrats 
and  radicals  to  republican  forms  of  government  and 
their  toleration  of  monarchical  institutions.  At  any 
rate,  he  will  not  fall  into  the  error  of  assuming  in- 
tentional disloyalty  to  the  democratic  principle  on 
the  part  of  the  British  trade  unions,  Fabians  and 
advanced  liberals. 

Even  in  Germany  democracy  is  much  stronger 
and  more  active  and  general  than  most  of  us  sup- 
pose. Fifty  years  of  militarism,  profitable  warfare 
and  "glory,"  control  of  public  education  in  all  of 
its  branches  by  the  bureaucracy  and  the  junkers, 
and,  perhaps,  certain  painful  national  memories  of 
foreign  exploitation  of  German  weakness  and  dis- 
union in  the  past  have  combined  to  retard  the 
growth  of  liberalism  and  democracy  in  the  Teu- 
tonic empire.  Slow  growth  is,  however,  not  to  be 
mistaken  for  stagnation  or  for  retrogression.  The 
ultimate  triumph  of  democracy  in  Germany  cannot 
be  doubted  by  the  serious  student  of  history  and  of 
politico-social  evolution. 

Even  in  the  East,  where,  according  to  certain 
superficial  philosophers,  human  nature  is  different 
than  in  the  West,  democratic  institutions  are  taking 
root.  The  wretched  fallacy  that  certain  peoples  are 
incapable  of  self-government  and  must  always  be 
ruled  by  superior  races  is  being  abandoned  even  by 


118  OUR  REVOLUTION 

some  elements  of  European  and  American  toryism. 
India  now  has  a  definite  promise  of  home  rule  and 
free  institutions.  In  China  efforts  to  restore  the 
monarchy  have  signally  failed.  Japan  has  vigorous 
political  parties  that  only  respect  the  forms  and 
shadow  of  feudalism  in  government  while  repudiat- 
ing its  substance.  The  Philippine  Islands,  thanks 
to  the  staunch  American  democrats  and  anti-impe- 
rialists, have  certainly  furnished  a  striking  object 
lesson  to  the  tory  doubters  or  reactionaries.  The 
Filipino  is  giving  a  good  account  of  himself  in  the 
local  and  general  elective  bodies  that  have  been 
created,  and  it  is  clear  that  all  he  needs  is  more 
education  and  opportunity. 

To  repeat,  never  has  the  idea,  the  principle,  of 
democracy  been  more  firmly  established  than  today. 
The  great  world  war  has  definitely  become  a  war 
between  confident,  advancing,  invincible  democracy 
and  decadent,  discredited  autocracy  and  feudalism. 
With  the  issue  clarified  and  simplified,  the  outcome 
cannot  be  uncertain.  Democracy  must  and  shall 
win,  and  progress  in  every  direction  must  and  shall 
be  resumed  along  democratic  lines. 

Yet  at  this  historic  conjuncture  some  writers  of 
standing  and  distinction  have  seen  fit  to  make  sys- 
tematic and  deliberate  assaults  on  the  democratic 
principle.  Their  arguments  are  weak,  sophistical, 
fallacious,  but  they  may  none  the  less  confuse,  mis- 
lead or  at  least  puzzle  many  persons  whose  grip  on 


RECENT  ASSAULTS  ON  DEMOCRACY  119 

first  principles  or  important  historic  facts  is  not 
sufficiently  strong  to  enable  them  to  detect  rhetor- 
ical juggling,  irrelevant  distinctions  and  hollow 
subtleties. 

W.  H.  Mallock,  a  veteran  warrior  of  the  Quixote 
type,  an  old  intellectual  foe  of  radicalism,  has  writ- 
ten a  bulky  volume  of  several  hundred  pages  on 
"The  Limits  of  Democracy."  Strangely  enough,  a 
liberal  American  reviewer  who  ought  not  to  have 
been  imposed  upon  by  Mr.  Mallock's  superficial 
brilliancy  and  dialectic  skill,  has  described  the  book 
as  "a  thoughtful"  study  of  democracy  in  its  good 
and  bad  aspects.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  study  is 
not  thoughtful.  Thought  is  precisely  what  it  lacks. 
The  volume  represents  a  sad  waste  of  energy  and 
ingenuity.  It  is  scientifically  pointless  and  prac- 
tically valueless — except  for  mischief. 

Mr.  Mallock's  central  contention  is  that  there 
is  no  such  thing  as  democratic  government;  that  a 
government  of,  by  and  for  the  people — a  phrase,  by 
the  way,  which  he  ridicules  because,  forsooth,  it  is 
inexact,  repetitious  and  even  a  little  ambiguous,  as 
if  the  essential  meaning  of  the  phrase  were  not 
absolutely  clear  and  instantly  intelligible  to  all! — 
never  has  existed  and  never  can  exist,  and  that 
government  necessarily  involves  the  union  or  the 
co-operation  of  two  opposite  principles,  the  demo- 
cratic and  the  oligarchic. 

Let  Mr.  Mallock  speak  for  himself.    He  says : 


120  OUR  REVOLUTION 

"All  current  definitions  of  democracy  err,  even 
before  they  are  stated,  by  reason  of  a  false  assump- 
tion which  underlies  the  formulation  of  all  of  them. 
They  all  assume  that  democracy  is  a  system  of  gov- 
ernment of  some  kind.  This  is  precisely  what,  ex- 
cept in  primitive  and  minute  communities,  pure 
democracy  is  not,  nor  ever  has  been,  nor  ever  can 
be.  It  is  simply  one  principle  out  of  two,  the  other 
being  that  of  oligarchy,  which  two  may  indeed  be 
combined  in  very  various  proportions,  but  neither 
of  which  alone  will  produce  what  is  meant  by  a 
government." 

The  last  page  of  Mr.  Mallock's  book  sums  up 
the  whole  argument  as  follows: 

"Democracy  and  oligarchy  are  principles  not 
mutually  exclusive.  ...  In  any  great  and  complex 
state  the  one  is  the  complement  of  the  other.  .  .  . 
In  any  great  and  complex  state  democracy  only 
knows  itself  through  the  cooperation  of  oligarchy; 
the  many  can  prosper  only  through  the  participa- 
tion in  benefits  which,  in  the  way  alike  of  material 
comfort,  opportunity,  culture  and  social  freedom, 
would  be  possible  for  no  one  unless  the  many  sub- 
mitted themselves  to  the  influence  or  authority  of 
the  supercapable  few." 

Mr.  Mallock  sternly  rebukes  the  democratic  lead- 
ers of  England  and  America,  President  Wilson  and 
Premier  Lloyd  George,  for  what  he  calls  "their 
great  suppressio  veri,"  or  the  insistent  use  of  a 


RECENT  ASSAULTS  ON  DEMOCRACY 

formula  by  which  the  principle  of  oligarchy  is  de- 
nied. He  severely  asks  whether  such  procedure 
would  be  tolerated  in  chemistry,  medicine  or  engi- 
neering! He  implies  that  it  is  intellectually  dis- 
honest in  statesmen  and  publicists  to  ignore  the  oli- 
garchic principle  and  talk  to  the  ignorant  about 
democratic  institutions,  democratic  government, 
democratic  ideals,  and  so  on. 

The  sincere  democrat,  argues  Mr.  Mallock,  is 
also  a  sincere  oligarch,  for  he  realizes  that  the  exer- 
cise of  personal  power  or  influence  is  the  exercise  of 
exceptional  faculties  not  possessed  in  equal  degree 
by  all.  President  Wilson  is  an  oligarch,  since  he 
has  influenced  the  will  of  a  great,  heterogeneous 
nation  by  the  exercise  of  his  personal  gifts  and  rare 
faculties.  A  great  labor  leader,  a  great  Socialist 
agitator  and  orator,  a  great  revolutionary  con- 
spirator and  organizer  are  severally  oligarchs. 
Why,  then,  refuse  to  admit  this  vital  truth? 

Because,  dear  Mr.  Mallock,  it  is  not  a  truth  at 
all. 

Whether  democracy  is  all-sufficient  as  a  principle, 
or  whether  oligarchy  is  equally  indispensable  in 
government  is  a  question  that  cannot  be  answered 
intelligently  unless  there  is  first  of  all  an  agree- 
ment as  to  the  definitions  of  the  terms  "democracy" 
and  "oligarchy."  Mr.  Mallock  could  not  have  pro- 
ceeded very  far  had  he  stopped  to  reach  an  under- 
standing concerning  such  definitions.  His  thought 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

is  confused  because  his  language  is  loose,  inaccur- 
ate and  arbitrary. 

Now  by  democracy  and  democratic  government  we 
mean  neither  more  nor  less  than  government  based 
on  what  is  called  universal  adult  suffrage,  on  the 
principle  that  each  voter  casts  but  one  vote  that  has 
the  same  weight  as  any  other  vote,  and  on  the  prin- 
ciple that  government  rests  on  the  "consent  of  the 
governed,"  a  majority  usually,  though  not  always, 
determining  what  the  laws  of  the  country  shall  be 
and  by  whom  they  shall  be  administered.  These  are 
all  simple  conceptions,  and  as  a  matter  of  fact  no 
person  of  ordinary  intelligence  has  ever  been  misled 
by  them.  Democracy  precludes  hereditary  rule, 
whether  in  a  legislature  or  in  the  executive;  democ- 
racy precludes  plural  voting,  democracy  precludes 
any  form  or  degree  of  governmental  authority  that 
claims  any  sort  of  sanction  other  than  popular  con- 
sent and  approval. 

Certain  governments  are  more  democratic  than 
others,  but  there  is  never  any  mystery  or  difficulty 
about  the  tests  that  determine  the  degree  of  democ- 
racy in  any  given  government.  The  British  mon- 
archy is,  as  we  have  seen,  undemocratic.  The  Brit- 
ish House  of  Lords  is  undemocratic.  The  claim 
of  our  own  Judiciary  to  set  aside  legislation  is  un- 
democratic, because  no  such  power  can  be  shown  to 
have  been  conferred  upon  the  Judiciary  by  the  peo- 
ple. Whenever  the  suffrage  is  extended,  everybody 


RECENT  ASSAULTS  ON  DEMOCRACY  123 

knows  and  says  that  it  has  been  made  "more  demo- 
cratic." Adult  suffrage  is  more  democratic  than 
manhood  suffrage. 

Again,  direct  legislation,  legislation  through  the 
referendum  and  initiative,  is  very  properly  consid- 
ered to  be  more  democratic  than  legislation  by 
elected  representatives  of  the  people.  Add  the  re- 
call to  a  political  system  otherwise  quite  advanced, 
and  democracy  concededly  has  been  moved  up  an- 
other notch.  Whether  or  not  the  majority  of  a 
state  or  community  should  have  their  way  in  every- 
thing, and  should  have  their  way  incontinently,  with- 
out delays  and  obstacles,  may  be  a  most  important 
question.  But  even  if  majority  rule  is  limited,  and 
minority  rights  are  safeguarded  in  certain  direc- 
tions, the  point  is  that  under  democracy  the  major- 
ity themselves  accept  such  limitations.  They  are 
not  imposed  by  any  autocrat  or  oligarchy. 

Now  turn  to  oligarchy.  The  term  is  defined  by 
dictionaries  as  the  rule  of  a  small  caste  or  a  few 
persons.  It  is  a  perfectly  valid  definition.  No  one 
has  ever  quarreled  with  it.  How,  then,  can  Mr. 
Mallock  assert  that  in  every  great  and  complex 
state  oligarchy  is  as  essential  as  democracy?  How 
is  it  possible  to  have  a  government  that  is  popular, 
democratic,  and  at  the  same  time  oligarchical,  un- 
democratic ? 

Mr.  Mallock  is  guilty  of  a  transparent  verbal 
trick.  He  smuggles  into  the  discussion  a  peculiar 


124  OUR  REVOLUTION 

definition  of  oligarchy.  It  means  to  him  not  the 
rule,  government,  arbitrary  power  of  the  few,  but 
the  moral  influence  and  moral  authority  of  the  few, 
the  supercapable,  as  he  calls  them.  The  inspiring 
orator  who  thrills  an  audience  and  secures  from  it 
an  indorsement  of  his  view  is  an  oligarch,  according 
to  Mr.  Mallock.  The  powerful  writer,  the  political 
leader  in  or  out  of  office,  the  organizer,  the  pioneer 
and  innovator  are  all  oligarchs.  And  because  no 
government  is  possible  without  leadership,  initiative, 
and  the  submission  of  the  many  to  the  intellectual 
and  moral  authority  of  the  few,  Mr.  Mallock  jumps 
to  the  conclusion  that  there  is  no  such  thing  as 
democratic' government,  and  that  oligarchy  is  es- 
sential and  unavoidable!  What  logic!  Who  has 
ever  asserted  that  democracies  can  dispense  with 
leadership  and  moral  authority?  Who  has  ever 
maintained  that  the  opinions  of  one  man  must  carry 
as  much  weight  as  those  of  any  other  men?  Mr. 
Mallock's  fallacy  is  as  gross  as  would  be  that  of 
failing  to  distinguish  between  driving  men  with  a 
whip  and  leading  them  by  personal  magnetism  and 
intellectual  power. 

Of  course,  the  greater  and  more  complex  a  state 
is  the  greater  is  the  need  of  ability,  vision,  knowl- 
edge, statesmanship,  wisdom  and  moral  courage  in 
those  who  are  intrusted  with  the  direction  of  its  af- 
fairs and  the  shaping  of  its  policies.  A  democracy 
cannot  flourish  under  weak,  bad  or  timid  and  un- 


RECENT  ASSAULTS  ON  DEMOCRACY  125 

principled  leaders.  But  these  statements  are  tru- 
isms. The  whole  point  is  that  under  democratic 
forms  of  government  the  people  have  the  power  and 
recurrent  opportunity  to  dismiss  bad  or  inefficient 
servants,  and  to  put  better  ones  in  their  place,  while 
under  oligarchy  or  autocracy  the  people  cannot 
throw  off  the  yoke  of  bad  rulers  and  must  endure 
and  suffer  until  the  limits  of  popular  patience  are 
passed  and  an  explosion — called  a  revolution — 
occurs. 

If  Mr.  Mallock  had  arraigned  democracies  for 
their  tendency  to  place  bad  and  weak  men  in  power, 
and  for  allowing  themselves  too  often  to  be  de- 
ceived and  duped  by  tools  of  predatory  privilege 
posing  as  champions  of  the  people,  the  most  militant 
of  radicals  and  democrats  would  have  applauded 
him.  In  the  long  run  the  people  have  the  kind  of 
government  they  deserve.  In  the  long  run  the  people 
have  as  much  liberty  and  opportunity  as  they  are 
educated  to  demand  and  fit  to  enjoy.  But  under 
democracy  the  people  are  always  sure  to  have  hon- 
est, high-minded,  intelligent  leaders  out  of  power 
and  office  to  direct  their  attention  to  the  tyranny  or 
corruption  or  ignorance  of  the  men  in  office.  Under 
oligarchy  or  autocracy  such  insurgent,  unofficial 
leaders  are  suppressed  and  the  people  kept  in  dark- 
ness and  ignorance. 

So  much  for  Mr.  Mallock's  politics.  In  attack- 
ing what  is  called  today  "industrial  democracy"  Mr. 


126  •  OUR  REVOLUTION 

Mallock  is  even  more  contemptuous  of  the  radical 
position  and  more  rapturous  in  singing  the  praises 
of  the  oligarchic  principle.  Industrial  democracy, 
forsooth,  rails  Mr.  Mallock.  What  would  your  ten 
thousand  laborers  do  without  a  supercapable  oli- 
garch, the  captain,  the  director,  the  entrepreneur, 
the  originator  and  the  energetic  executive?  Let  the 
oligarch  strike,  and  the  shop  or  mill  comes  to  a 
standstill.  Let  the  laborers  strike,  and  other  labor- 
ers will  be  found  to  take  their  jobs.  The  captain  is 
indispensable;  he  creates  the  jobs,  the  markets,  the 
opportunities.  Why,  all  the  communistic  and  so- 
cialistic colonies  and  experiments  have  proved  dis- 
mal failures,  and  all  because  the  oligarchical  prin- 
ciple was  disregarded  by  them!  The  members  re- 
fused to  submit  themselves  to  the  guidance  of  the 
supercapable  few,  of  captains  and  leaders,  and  the 
result  was  inefficiency — waste  and  friction. 

Now,  whatever  may  have  caused  the  failure  of 
communistic  experiments,  there  is  no  sane  advocate 
of  industrial  democracy  today  who  does  not  em- 
phasize the  necessity  of  competent  direction  of  in- 
dustrial enterprises.  Co-operation  is  not  unsuc- 
cessful in  Britain,  in  France,  in  Holland,  and  we 
know  that  the  cooperative  movement  has  had,  and 
has,  very  able  and  competent  leaders.  Mr.  Mallock 
may  choose  to  call  these  oligarchs,  but  the  members 
of  the  co-operative  societies  will  only  laugh  at  him. 
They  know  that  they  have  surrendered  nothing  of 


RECENT  ASSAULTS  ON  DEMOCRACY  127 

value  in  democracy,  in  the  principle  of  freedom,  in 
consenting  to  direction  of  co-operative  industry  by 
competent  men  selected  by  them  for  their  compe- 
tence with  a  view  to  the  good  of  all.  Co-operative 
industry  is  properly  called  democratic,  because  each 
co-operator  is  a  partner,  a  member  having  equal 
fundamental  rights.  The  contrast  between  co- 
operative industry  and  autocratic  industry  was 
recognized  even  by  that  uncompromising  individual- 
ist, Herbert  Spencer,  who  predicted  the  ultimate 
supersession  of  the  wage-system  by  co-operation 
without  compulsion  by  reason  of  the  greater  free- 
dom, dignity,  self-respect  and  efficiency  of  the  work- 
ers in  a  well-managed  co-operative  establishment. 

Mr.  Mallock's  real  notion  is  that  democracy  and 
chaos  are  interchangeable  terms ;  that  democracy 
implies  jealousy,  fear  and  dislike  of  the  capable,  and 
the  settlement  of  every  question  by  a  majority  vote 
after  noisy  and  disorderly  mass  meetings.  He  loses 
sight  of  the  fact  that  even  philosophical  anarchists, 
who  dream  of  a  social  organization  sans  any  element 
of  compulsion,  form  clubs,  adopt  rules,  elect  chair- 
men, and  see  nothing  humiliating  or  undemocratic 
in  submitting  themselves  to  the  moral  authority  and 
influence  of  brilliant  or  persuasive  men ! 

In  fine,  Mr.  Mallock  has  discovered  no  unknown 
or  neglected  limits  of  democracy.  His  attack  on  de- 
mocracy is  an  attack  on  a  figment  of  his  own 
imagination.  His  defense  of  oligarchy  is  a  piece  of 


128  OUR  REVOLUTION 

sophistry,  and  his  attempt  to  revive  and  vindicate 
that  "principle"  is  pathetically  futile.  Quite  as 
"good"  an  argument  as  his  can  be  made  for  autoc- 
racy and  aristocracy.  Juggling  and  arbitrary 
definitions  will  accomplish  almost  anything — on  pa- 
per, and  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  sophists.  Only 
by  grossly  and  unwarrantably  misrepresenting  de- 
mocracy does  Mr.  Mallock  make  a  sort  of  case  for 
oligarchy. 


INCOME  AND  THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE 

A  FIRM  belief  in  progress  is  implied  in  the  familiar 
quotation,  "No  question  is  settled  until  it  is  settled 
right."  That  so  many  men — that,  indeed,  the  aver- 
age man — should  unhesitatingly  subscribe  to  that  as- 
sertion or  generalization  is  indisputably  a  signifi- 
cant fact,  one  that  attests  the  ingrained  belief  in  the 
idea  of  progress.  Taking  a  concrete  case,  if  we 
should  say  that  the  interest  question  will  never  be 
settled  until  it  is  settled  right,  would  any  thoughtful 
man  venture  to  challenge  the  affirmation?  Nothing 
is  more  striking  in  the  features  of  our  age  than  the 
universal  acceptance  of  the  principle  of  service — that 
is,  of  service  as  the  only  basis  of  reward  or  title 
thereto.  The  complexities  of  our  industrial  and  so- 
cial order  are  such  that  our  definitions  of  "work" 
or  of  "service"  must  necessarily  be  broader  and 
subtler  than  those  of  a  primitive  and  simple  commun- 
ity; but  the  principle  is  not  affected  by  the  super- 
ficial complexities.  More  and  more  generally  is  the 
doctrine  accepted  as  a  matter  of  course  that  he  who 
does  not  work  or  usefully  serve  has  no  right  to  sup- 
port, to  income.  If  this  be  not  proof  of  moral  ad- 
vance, no  such  proof  is  in  truth  conceivable. 

129 


130  OUR  REVOLUTION 

Professor  Scott  Nearing  has  in  a  manner  wholly 
modern  reopened  the  whole  question  of  title  to  income. 

In  his  book  on  Income,  as  well  as  in  a  recent  con- 

• 

tribution  to  The  Journal  of  Sociology,  he  issued  a 
challenge  to  the  economic  and  ethical  champions  of 
"property  income,"  and  particularly  of  interest.  He 
would  be  the  last  man  to  claim  that  he  has  given  this 
subject  exhaustive  or  searching  treatment.  But  he 
has  boldly  and  vigorously  raised  a  question  that  too 
many  writers  and  thinkers  had  forgotten.  To  some 
of  his  incidental  views  exception  may  be  taken ;  but 
his  facts  and  his  figures  are  so  impressive  that  the 
most  complacent  and  Panglossian  of  publicists  will 
find  it  impossible  to  ignore  them  or  dismiss  them 
with  the  stereotyped  platitudes. 

Billions,  Mr.  Nearing  shows,  are  claimed  and  col- 
lected annually  by  holders  of  titles  to  property  in 
various  shapes  or  forms.  These  proprietors,  in  the 
great  majority  of  cases,  render  no  palpable  service 
to  society;  or,  if  they  do  render  such  service,  they 
receive  compensation  for  it  apart  from  the  income 
they  derive  from  their  "investments."  What  are 
these  billions  of  "property  income"  paid  for?  What 
is  society  getting  for  them?  If  society  gets  nothing 
in  return,  then  property  income  is  sheer  robbery,  as 
Proudhon  maintained.  If  society  gets  something, 
then,  of  course,  the  principle  of  service  is  not  vio- 
lated. But  what  is  that  something? 

Professor  Nearing  has  briefly  examined  and  dis- 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE   131 

posed  of  certain  conventional  theories  of  property 
income.  The  present  writer  wishes  in  this  paper  to 
pursue  a  somewhat  different  line  of  argument  and  to 
analyze  other  theories  that  have  been  advanced  to 
justify  interest.  Some  conclusions  may  be  ventured 
upon  at  the  close. 

There  are  three  main  sources  of  property  income. 
Two  of  them,  profit  and  rent,  will  not  detain  us. 
Profit  is  defined  as  the  wage  of  the  enterprising  cap- 
italist, the  employer  of  labor.  The  normal  rate  of 
profit  in  business  is  not  excessive,  and  where  the 
employer  is  an  active  worker,  his  profit  may  indeed  be 
his  wages — and  he  is  worthy  of  his  hire.  Where  the 
profit  is  extraordinarily  large  we  find  either  the  ele- 
ment of  privilege,  of  monopoly — legal  or  illegal — 
or  the  element  of  rare  ability,  of  genius,  or  a  com- 
bination of  both  elements.  No  one  complains  of  the 
"profits"  of  the  average  farmer,  or  of  the  small 
shopkeeper,  or  of  the  small  manufacturer.  "Differ- 
ential" profits,  commanded  by  superior  business  abil- 
ity or  the  gift  for  organization  and  administration, 
seldom  constitute  an  evil  or  menace,  since  they  tend 
to  disappear  where  competition  is  really  free  and  the 
laws  against  unfair  practices  or  monopolistic  oppres- 
sion are  enforced  with  reasonable  vigor  and  effective- 
ness. Whether  or  not  society  is  wise  in  its  patent 
and  copyright  policies  is  a  question  that  may  be 
passed  over  on  this  occasion.  Even  if  we  assume  that 
some  injustice  is  traceable  to  these  policies,  that  in- 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

justice  is  not  serious  enough  to  threaten  social  stabil- 
ity and  social  progress.  An  intelligent  assault  on 
profit  is  at  bottom  an  assault  on  privilege  and  mo- 
nopoly. 

Rent  is  defined  by  economists  as  the  price  paid 
for  the  use  of  a  monopolized  natural  agent.  Now, 
where  land  monopoly  or  the  monopolization  of  other 
natural  resources  begets  rent,  our  quarrel  is  with 
the  monopoly,  not  with  any  theory  of  rent,  classical 
or  modern.  Rent  will  arise  under  certain  conditions, 
and  what  society  has  been  asking  more  and  more  per- 
sistently is  whether  these  conditions  are  "natural" 
— that  is,  morally  defensible  and  right.  Where  the 
conditions  represent  feudal  survivals,  expropriation 
of  the  tillers  of  the  soil,  inclosures  of  commons  con- 
trary to  law  or  with  the  sanction  of  class-controlled 
parliaments ;  where  the  monopoly  of  land  and  mines 
and  other  natural  resources  may  be  traced  to  royal 
grants  or  perfectly  arbitrary  and  profligate  surren- 
der of  the  common  heritage,  the  case  is  morally  sim- 
ple enough,  even  if  practically  any  attempted  recti- 
fication may  be  full  of  difficulties  and  dangers.  In 
France,  a  great  revolution  transferred  the  land  to  the 
peasant  masses  and  in  a  terrible,  sanguinary  manner 
solved  a  problem  that  would  have  plagued  genera- 
tions. In  Ireland,  land  purchase  on  an  extraordin- 
ary scale  is  effecting  a  peaceable  revolution  and  solv- 
ing the  "rack  rent"  problem  and  the  problem  of  ab- 
sentee and  parasitic  landlordism.  The  wisdom  and 


INCOME  ANt>  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE   133 

beneficence  of  the  Irish  land-purchase  legislation — 
so  fiercely  attacked  when  initiated  by  a  liberal  cab- 
inet and  popular  premier — no  one  now  seriously  ques- 
tions. Wherever  the  land  question  is  "up  for  solu- 
tion," the  solution  is  certain  to  be  found  in  the 
abolition  of  monopoly  and  the  transfer  of  land  to 
occupying  owners  and  cultivators.  Nationalization, 
the  single  tax,  and  other  schemes  severally  contain 
the  essential  and  saving  idea  of  equalization  of  nat- 
ural opportunity.  None  of  the  familiar  schemes  may 
get  itself  accepted  in  the  precise  form  favored  by  its 
advocates,  but  the  general  direction  and  the  true  na- 
ture of  the  reforms  that  are  surely  "coming"  are 
unmistakably  indicated  to  the  impartial  students  of 
the  land  and  rent  questions. 

Nor  is  this  at  all  surprising.  The  average  man, 
who  applies  "mere  common-sense"  to  everything, 
agrees  with  the  most  anxious  and  scholarly  investiga- 
tor of  "origins"  and  tenures  that  land  monopoly  is 
immoral,  anti-social,  and  in  the  long  run  "impos- 
sible." The  wonderful  success  of  Henry  George's 
Progress  and  Poverty  is  due  to  this  fact.  Scientific 
economists  found  much  in  the  book  to  deride  and 
condemn ;  but  its  appeal  to  common  morality  and  to 
the  rule  of  reason  was,  as  to  the  fundamental  issue, 
irresistible.  The  land  is  not  the  product  of  man's 
labor;  the  right  of  one  man  to  a  place  in  the  sun, 
or  on  the  earth,  is  neither  greater  nor  less  than  that 
of  another ;  no  generation  may  crowd  another  off  the 


184  OUR  REVOLUTION 

earth;  therefore  all  land  arrangements  are  subject  to 
modification  at  the  dictates  of  social  need  and  social 
expediency.  Arguments  like  these  are  simply  unan- 
swerable, and  whoever  has  attempted  to  answer  them 
has  had  to  fall  back  on  the  plea  that,  whatever  may 
be  the  case  with  the  Ricardian  "properties  of  the 
soil,"  native  and  indestructible,  land  today  is  gener- 
ally the  product  of  man's  capital  and  labor.  Land 
has  for  generations  been  bought  and  sold  like  other 
commodities;  capital  has  been  invested  therein;  im- 
provements, the  maintenance  or  even  the  increase  of 
fertility  are  the  work  of  man,  not  of  nature.  How, 
then,  can  we  reopen  the  ancient  question  of  title  to 
the  original  form  and  quality  of  the  property?  If 
we  wish  to  be  honest  and  contemplate  compensation 
to  the  present  owners  (as  in  the  case  of  the  above- 
mentioned  Irish  example),  it  is  supposed  to  be  demon- 
strable that  the  operation  would  cost  more  than  it  is 
worth  to  society. 

Without  analyzing  these  and  similar  arguments  (in 
truth,  they  are  hardly  worth  analysis),  it  is  impor- 
tant to  note  here  that  what,  after  all,  emerges  from 
them  is  the  claim  that  rent  today  is  largely  or  mostly 
interest  on  capital  invested  in  land  rather  than  pay- 
ment for  the  use  of  a  natural  agent  or  factor  that 
has  somehow  been  appropriated  by  this  or  that  per- 
son. 

It  may  be  added  that,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  a  great 
deal  of  what  is  conventionally  described  and  classi- 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE  135 

fied  as  profit  or  rent  is  in  reality  nothing  but  inter- 
est on  capital.  Professor  Nearing  is  right  in  ob- 
jecting to  the  old  classification  and  in  urging  that 
the  subject  of  income  be  considered  in  a  new  light 
and  with  reference  to  the  notorious  facts  of  the  pres- 
ent economic  and  social  order. 

The  knotty,  the  crucial,  the  basic  question  is  the 
question  of  interest.  If  interest  is  wrong,  the  other 
forms  of  property  income  will  fall  with  it;  but  if 
interest  is  right  and  defensible,  then  the  assaults  on 
rent  and  profit  are  generally  vain  and  futile,  except 
in  so  far  as  they  are  assaults  on  naked  monopoly. 

Now,  interest  has  staunch  and  convinced  defenders, 
not  only  among  the  scientific  economists,  but  also 
among  the  plain,  hard-headed  men  of  affairs,  and 
even  among  the  working  classes.  Professor  Nearing 
candidly  recognizes  this  fact.  Is  it  not  a  significant 
fact?  May  there  not  be  a  soul  of  good  in  a  thing 
seemingly  evil  that  is  yet  widely  accepted  as  natural 
and  right? 

Perhaps  the  best  way  to  analyze  interest  is  to  take 
first  the  common-sense  view  of  the  average  man — 
the  average  toiler,  even,  who  keeps  his  hard-earned 
savings  in  a  bank,  and  draws  interest  on  them  at  the 
"low"  rate  of  3  or  3x/2  Per  cent- 

Now,  let  us  approach  a  thrifty  mechanic  and  tell 
him  that  interest  is  immoral  and  unjust — a  modern 
form  of  exploitation  and  robbery.  What  will  he  be 
likely  to  think  aloud?  Something  like  this,  it  is 


136  OUR  REVOLUTION 

safe  to  say:  "I  have  worked  hard  and  still  work 
hard.  I  have  to  deprive  myself  of  all  sorts  of  little 
comforts  and  pleasures  to  which  I  think  I  am  fairly 
entitled — amusements,  little  trips,  vacations,  an  ex- 
tra hat  for  my  wife  or  daughter,  a  nice  little  birth- 
day dinner  at  a  good  restaurant.  I  have  friends 
and  acquaintances  who  earn  no  more,  or  even  per- 
haps less,  than  I  do,  and  who  allow  themselves  such 
occasional  luxuries.  They  have  saved  little,  if  any, 
of  their  earnings.  This  has  been  imprudent  and 
wrong  on  their  part,  as  every  moralist  and  economist 
tells  us.  If  I,  on  the  other  hand,  have  put  my  hon- 
est savings  in  a  bank,  is  it  not  perfectly  fair  that  I 
should  get  some  interest  on  my  money?" 

This,  of  course,  is  a  simple,  unadorned  version  of 
the  abstinence  theory  of  interest.  The  mechanic  de- 
mands a  reward  for  his  self-denial,  his  thrift,  his 
economy.  Suppose  we  answer  him  by  pointing  out 
that  what,  in  effect,  he  is  asking  is  that  he  be  per- 
mitted to  eat  his  cake  and  have  it  too — have  it 
whole  and  unimpaired;  suppose  we  point  out  to  him 
that  his  savings  are  his  reward,  the  sole  and  sufficient 
reward  of  his  abstinence  and  thrift;  that  his  less 
prudent  friends  may  live  to  regret  their  self-indul- 
gence, since  they  have  nothing  to  fall  back  on  in  the 
event  of  accident  or  misfortune,  and  since  old  age 
may  find  them  destitute  and  condemned  to  depen- 
dence on  charity,  while  he,  because  of  his  virtue  and 
foresight,  enjoys  freedom  from  worry  and  dread,  is 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE  137 

able  to  sleep  peacefully,  and  to  face  the  future  serene- 
ly. Suppose  we  say  all  this  to  him  and  ask  him 
whether  he  still  thinks  society  owes  him  interest; 
what  is  likely  to  be  his  rejoinder? 

This,  probably:  that  while  the  foregoing  reason- 
ing might  be  valid  in  a  case  where  a  man  kept  his 
little  hoard  at  home,  in  a  secret  place,  idle  and  use- 
less to  the  body  social  and  economic,  it  is  not 
valid  in  a  case  like  his,  for  he  puts  his  savings  in  a 
bank  and  through  the  bank  into  circulation,  and,  as 
everybody  knows,  banks  lend  money  to  their  custom- 
ers and  charge  them  interest  on  it.  Why  should  the 
bank  get  the  interest  earned  by  the  money  of  the 
depositors?  It  may  be  entitled  to  part  of  the  inter- 
est, since  it  takes  care  of  the  money,  provides  safety 
vaults  for  it,  and  incurs  expenses  of  administration. 
But  under  modern  conditions  the  compensation  for 
the  bank's  service  to  the  depositor  need  not  be  large, 
need  not  absorb  the  entire  interest  earned  by  his 
money.  Indeed,  many  commercial  banks  pay  interest 
to  depositors  on  their  average  daily  balances.  Hence, 
the  man  who  puts  his  savings  into  a  savings  bank  ex- 
pects and  gets  interest  on  his  money. 

Again,  this  common-sense  answer  is  wholly  satis- 
factory as  far  as  it  goes.  But  it  merely  pushes  the 
real  question  one  step  back — from  the  individual  de- 
positor to  the  bank.  How  does  the  bank  earn  the 
interest?  Why  is  it  able  to  charge  interest? 

Here  the  average  person  will  perhaps  pause  for  a 


138  OUR  REVOLUTION 

moment  and  then  advance  a  more  complicated  theory, 
a  compound  of  the  two  distinct  theories  of  absti- 
nence and  productivity.  He  will  explain  that  the 
bank  is  able  to  charge  interest  because  its  borrowers 
use  the  money  productively  and  profitably.  The 
manufacturer  and  the  merchant,  the  exporter  and 
the  jobber,  the  speculator  and  the  exchange  operator 
— all  these  borrow  money  of  the  bank  in  order  to 
"make"  money,  to  make  more  money  than  they  could 
make  without  the  additional  capital  thus  obtained. 
Our  common-sense  defender  of  interest  will  therefore 
proceed  to  argue  thus :  "He  who  borrows  my  savings 
of  the  bank  hands  me  over,  as  interest,  part  of  his 
increased  income.  He  makes  more  because  of  my 
money,  and  he  is  perfectly  willing  to  divide  the  in- 
crease with  me.  My  abstinence  and  self-denial  are 
advantageous  to  him ;  and  my  interest  is  not  a  reward 
of  virtue  in  the  abstract,  but  a  reward  of  virtue  that 
is  directly  and  immediately  useful  to  him  and  there- 
fore to  industrial  society.  Why,  then,  is  this  inter- 
est unjust?" 

This  little  argument  amounts  to  this — that  interest 
is  payment  for  service.  Abstinence  on  the  part  of 
some  enables  others  to  do  business  on  a  larger  scale 
than  they  could  otherwise  undertake ;  they  realize 
larger  gains  or  profits,  and  in  paying  interest  they 
pay  for  a  distinct  service  rendered  them  by  the  ab- 
stainers. 

The  learned  political  economists  make  the  same 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE  139 

argument  in  more  technical  and  scientific  language. 
They  do  not,  gifts  and  legacies  aside,  quarrel  with 
the  principle  of  service,  or  with  the  formula,  "No 
work,  no  food";  but  they  contend  that  the  man  of 
property  who  lends  his  money  to  another  for  use  in 
industry  or  commerce  performs  a  valuable  service — 
"works,"  in  other  words,  by  letting  his  capital  work 
in  the  hands  of  another  man. 

But  how  do  the  learned  economists  meet  the  two 
objections  that  the  average  man,  armed  with  his  com- 
mon-sense and  little  business  experience,  can  hardly 
be  expected  to  know  how  to  meet? 

The  first  of  these  objections  is  that  abstinence 
has  its  reward  in  the  before-mentioned  security  and 
peace  which  it  brings,  and  is  really  not  entitled  to 
any  further  reward.  To  repeat  the  homely  simile 
used  already  in  the  discussion  with  the  average  prac- 
tical person,  the  man  who  saves  his  cake  has  it,  and 
if  he  lends  it  to  another  and  gets  back  another  cake 
of  the  same  quality  and  size,  he  has  all  the  reward 
he  would  seem  to  be  entitled  to.  Suppose  we  sit  down 
to  a  rich  meal  and  conclude  that  it  would  be  im- 
provident to  consume  all  that  is  spread  before  us. 
We  leave  something  for  the  next  meal,  this  act  pos- 
sibly involving  a  little  resistance  to  the  immediate 
appetite.  Is  not  the  next  meal  our  sufficient  reward? 
Do  we  need  an  additional  incentive? 

The  economist  thinks  that  we  do,  and  that,  in  a 
sense,  it  is  quite  reasonable  to  demand  that  we  eat 


140  OUR  REVOLUTION 

our  cake  and  have  it  too.  Perhaps  the  ablest  and 
keenest  defense  of  this  position  was  that  made  by 
Bohm-Bawerk,  the  Austrian  statesman  and  financier, 
in  his  well-known  work.  His  theory  of  interest  is  a 
modernized  and  purged  version  of  the  abstinence 
theory.  It  may  be  summarized  thus :  It  is  natural 
to  men  to  prefer  present  goods,  present  pleasures 
and  satisfactions,  to  future  goods,  pleasures,  or  sat- 
isfactions. The  thing  we  want  today  has  a  higher 
value  for  us,  psychologically  speaking,  than  the 
promise  of  the  same  thing  for  next  week  or  next 
month.  We  do  not  like  to  postpone  agreeable  things, 
and  sometimes  postponement  is  positively  painful. 
Besides,  the  future  is  uncertain;  we  may  not  live  to 
enjoy  the  promised  pleasure;  or  we  may  not  be  well 
enough  or  contented  enough  to  care  for  it.  To  de- 
fer the  consumption  of  goods  is,  therefore,  to  make  a 
real  sacrifice,  even  though  we  eventually  consume  the 
goods.  This  sacrifice,  moreover,  we  would  not  al- 
ways make  for  our  own  sake,  for  the  sake  of  future 
security  or  enjoyment.  To  induce  us  to  make  it, 
those  who  use  our  savings  must  pay  us  some  com- 
pensation. Interest  in  this  compensation;  it  rep- 
resents the  difference  in  value  between  present  goods 
and  future  goods. 

In  this  explanation,  manifestly,  the  economist  ap- 
peals to  psychology,  to  human  experience  at  large. 
It  must  be  admitted  at  once  that  the  alleged  differ- 
ence is  not  fanciful.  It  exists.  We  all  feel  it,  wheth- 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE  141 

er  we  have  to  defer  a  visit  to  the  theater  or  a  trip  to 
Europe.  And  it  must  also  be  admitted  that  the  sac- 
rifice involved  in  deferring  pleasure  or  enjoyment 
must  as  a  rule  be  paid  for.  But  all  this  is  hardly 
sufficient  to  justify  interest  as  we  know  it.  That  in- 
terest, as  now  paid,  is  nothing  but  compensation  for 
sacrifice  in  the  sense  indicated  is  pure  assumption. 
May  it  not  be  altogether  excessive  from  that  point 
of  view?  May  not  other  and  less  legitimate  ele- 
ments enter  into  it?  As  a  matter  of  fact,  we  shall 
see  that  other  elements  do  enter  into  interest. 

Here,  however,  the  second  objection  to  interest 
above  alluded  to  should  be  considered.  If  interest  is 
compensation  for  abstinence,  or  for  the  sacrifice  in- 
volved in  deferred  satisfactions,  in  giving  up  goods 
today  for  goods  to  be  consumed  in  the  future,  why 
is  interest  paid  to  those  who  do  not  abstain  and  do 
not  consciously  or  unconsciously  defer  any  pleas- 
ure? 

Professor  Nearing  in  his  Income  mentions  this 
objection  among  others  in  the  following  trenchant 
paragraph : 

This  income  [meaning  property  income]  is  not 
paid  in  return  for  meritorious  social  service ;  some  of 
those  who  receive  it  are  notoriously  anti-social  in  all 
their  dealings.  It  is  not  paid  for  abstinence;  many 
of  the  recipients  of  property  income  never  knew  what 
it  was  to  abstain.  It  is  not  paid  for  saving;  there 
are  many  people  with  vast  incomes  who  during  their 


142  OUR  REVOLUTION 

entire  lives  have  never  done  anything  except  spend. 
It  is  not  paid  for  productive  effort ;  children,  disabled 
persons,  idlers,  and  wastrels  are  among  its  recipients. 

Karl  Marx  and  Ferdinand  Lasalle,  in  their  day, 
directed  withering  sarcasms  at  this  same  theory  of 
abstinence,  self-denial,  and  sacrifice.  They  used  to 
point  to  the  idle  millionaires,  or  the  sons  and  daugh- 
ters of  such,  and  ask  whether  any  economist  of  the 
classical  school  would  have  the  audacity  to  assert 
that  they  have  practiced  abstinence  or  denied  them- 
selves anything  in  a  spirit  of  virtue  and  thrift. 

But  the  economists  find  this  line  of  reasoning  in- 
conclusive. They  remind  us  of  the  fact  that  it  is  the 
mass  of  "marginal  investors"  that  count,  and  that 
the  multimillionaire  who  draws  interest  without  un- 
dergoing hardship  and  sacrifice  no  more  disproves 
the  theory  in  question  than  does  the  poor  washer- 
woman or  seamstress  at  the  other  end  of  the  social 
scale,  whose  sacrifices  are  so  great  that  the  rate  of 
interest  she  can  command  at  any  time  on  her  slight 
savings  may  well  seem  a  pitifully  poor  compensation 
for  her  truly  heroic  degree  of  thrift  and  self-denial. 
The  economists  tell  us  elaborately  that  the  modern 
theory  of  interest  does  not  imply  that  where  there  is 
no  abstinence,  no  deferring  of  pleasures,  there  can  be 
no  interest,  any  more  than  that  it  implies  that  in 
every  case  the  interest  obtained  corresponds  strictly 
to  the  amount  and  quality  of  sacrifice  undergone  in 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE  143 

saving  the  money  that  draws  the  interest.  All  that 
the  theory  implies  is  that,  as  a  general  proposition, 
interest  is  reward  of  abstinence  and  self-denial,  and 
that  if  no  interest  were  paid,  few,  if  any,  would  defer 
satisfactions  and  save  any  part  of  their  income.  If 
nine-tenths  of  those  who  draw  interest,  directly  or 
indirectly,  do  practice  abstinence,  the  remaining 
tenth,  even  if  they  did  not  do  so,  would  be  able  to 
command  interest  all  the  same,  the  rate  being  deter- 
mined by  the  marginal  investors.  Once  the  level  is 
fixed,  we  may  find  thereon  cases  that  either  do  not 
deserve  to  be  there  or  that  deserve  to  be  on  a  higher 
level. 

It  must  be  owned  that  this  is  sound  and  valid  rea- 
soning. If  interest  can  be  justified  in  the  great  ma- 
jority of  cases,  the  idle  millionaire  with  his  income 
from  property  that  represents  no  sacrifice  will  cause 
no  trouble  to  the  adherents  of  the  abstinence  theory. 
But  the  justification  intended  for  the  majority  of 
cases  leaves  much  to  be  desired.  To  repeat,  we  may 
grant  that  the  marginal  investors  practice  self-denial 
and  deserve  compensation  therefor  without  being  un- 
der the  smallest  compulsion  to  grant  also  that  the 
interest  now  generally  paid  for  capital  is  nothing  but 
compensation  for  thrift  and  self-denial.  If  we  accuse 
a  man  of  having  stolen  a  dollar,  and  he  proves  that 
he  has  earned  and  saved  a  dime,  we  do  not  regard  the 
defense  as  adequate. 

Let  us  now  make  the  strongest  possible  case  for 


144  OUR  REVOLUTION 

interest  under  modern  industrial  and  commercial  con- 
ditions. Let  us  advance  several  illustrations  that 
seemingly  go  to  the  very  root  of  the  matter,  illustra- 
tions that  the  man  of  common-sense  and  the  scholarly 
economist  alike  will  concede  to  be  not  only  typical 
but  highly  favorable  to  their  view — illustrations,  in- 
deed, that  are  half  arguments. 

1.  A  man  has  saved  money,  or  inherited  it  from  a 
thrifty  and  honest  father,  and  has  bought  a  small 
farm  with  it.    He  has  a  chance  to  acquire  his  neigh- 
bor's small  farm,  and  he  is  desirous  of  doing  so.     It 
would  be  to  his  distinct  advantage  to  enlarge  his 
holdings.     But  he  has  no  money  in  the  bank  or  else- 
where.    He  decides  to  borrow.     He  borrows  of  an- 
other neighbor,  or  of  the  local  bank  in  which  many  of 
his  neighbors  keep  their  savings.     He  pays  interest 
on  the  loan — pays  it  gladly.    He  expects  to  profit  by 
the  operation.    The  profit  will  enable  him  to  pay  off 
the  debt. 

2.  A   man   of   exceptional   ability   and   initiative 
starts  a  small  business  with  his  own  capital.    He  suc- 
ceeds ;  his  business  grows ;  he  wishes  to  enlarge  his 
plant.    He  is  accommodated  by  a  bank,  or  by  a  pri- 
vate person.     He  pays  the  interest  and  nets  a  profit 
in  addition.     The  business  continues  to  expand,  and 
he  needs  more  and  more  capital.    The  banks  are  glad 
to  extend  him  credit.     He  becomes  rich  and  power- 
ful— a  captain  of  industry.     He  makes  millions,  in 
spite  of  the  interest  burden  he  has  had  to  carry  for 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE    145 

years.  He  has  enough  to  provide  for  his  children 
and  relatives,  and  to  endow  charitable  and  educa- 
tional institutions.  He  has  had  ample  reward  for  his 
skill  and  industry,  his  brains  and  enterprise.  But 
he  has  all  along  handed  over  certain  parts  of  his 
income  to  those  whose  capital  he  has  used  and  by 
means  of  which  he  has  accumulated  his  millions. 

3.  Several  men  of  business  ability  and  sound  mor- 
als discern  an  opportunity  or  industrial  "opening" 
of  which  they  cannot  take  advantage,  having  little  or 
no  capital  of  their  own.  They  organize  a  corpora- 
tion. They  sell  the  bonds  and  stocks  of  this  corpora- 
tion. The  investors  who  buy  the  bonds  or  stocks 
furnish  capital  and  nothing  more.  The  organizers 
and  entrepreneurs  take  charge  and  manage  the  af- 
fairs of  the  corporation.  They  employ  assistants 
and  superintendents.  They  prosper;  they  pay  the 
interest  on  the  bonds  and  the  dividends  on  the  pre- 
ferred stock;  there  is  a  balance  left.  The  balance 
they  claim  as  their  due.  It  represents  their  wages, 
but  it  may  be  large  enough  to  include  a  bonus,  a 
profit. 

Now,  these  and  similar  instances,  indefinitely  mul- 
tiplied and  more  or  less  varied,  exemplify  our  pres- 
ent industrial  and  financial  system.  Indirect  co- 
operation, joint  stock  companies,  high  organization 
of  credit  and  banking,  the  "mobilization"  and  use  of 
other  people's  savings  by  captains  of  industry  are 
among  the  salient  features  of  this  system.  Rail- 


146  OUR  REVOLUTION 

roads,  we  know,  are  owned  by  thousands  of  small 
stockholders.  The  presidents,  managers,  and  direc- 
tors are  really  the  paid  employees  of  the  true  own- 
ers, and  if  the  latter  have  but  little  power  and  few 
of  the  prerogatives  of  ownership,  that  fact  is  due  to 
their  lack  of  organization,  training,  and  knowledge. 
But  the  "true  owners"  do  no  work  and  perform  no 
service  apart  from  the  possible  service  under  inves- 
tigation— the  furnishing  of  the  capital. 

What  is  true  of  railroads  is  true  of  banks,  ship- 
ping companies,  mines,  mills,  and  factories.  The 
owners  of  a  concern  may  be  "little  fellows"  scattered 
all  over  the  land.  The  average  holding  may  be  ex- 
ceedingly small.  And  the  progress  of  what  has  been 
called  the  "peopleization"  of  industry  tends  to  reduce 
instead  of  raise  that  average. 

The  true  picture  in  the  mind's  eye  is  not  therefore 
one  in  which  a  few  parasitic  idlers,  exploiters,  or 
"modern  robbers"  face  a  host  of  oppressed  mechan- 
ics, laborers,  and  clerks ;  it  is  one  of  thousands  of 
small  investors  arrayed  against  tens  of  thousands  of 
workers.  Not  few,  but  many,  get  the  property  in- 
come that  is  on  trial,  and  these  many  would  be 
startled  and  grieved  to  hear  themselves  described  as 
Proudhon  described  them — to  be  told  that  interest 
is  sheer  robbery. 

Still,  be  the  recipients  of  interest  few  or  many, 
the  principle  is  not  affected.  The  question  remains 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE  147 

open:  Is  interest  paid  for  any  real  service  to  indus- 
try and  society? 

Of  course,  the  farmer,  the  manufacturer,  the  man- 
agers of  the  corporation  in  the  illustrations  above 
given  would  maintain  strenuously  that  they  pay  in- 
terest for  real  and  important  services.  The  recipi- 
ents of  the  interest  would  even  more  strenuously 
maintain  that  it  represents  compensation  for  gen- 
uine service.  With  all  the  facts  before  one,  what 
can  he  say  at  this  stage  of  the  discussion?  Are 
the  objections  to  interest  as  irrational,  ignorant,  and 
demagogical  as  the  average  capitalist  thinks  they 
are?  Are  they  as  superficial  and  unscientific  as  the 
conservative  economist  holds  them  to  be  ?  Is  interest, 
in  spite  of  the  sentiments  of  religious  and  ethical 
teachers  to  the  contrary,  morally  justifiable  and  eco- 
nomically indispensable? 

It  seems  to  the  writer  that  the  true  answer  is  that 
"something"  is  wrong  with  interest  as  we  know  it, 
although  it  is  not  wrong  per  se  and  under  all  circum- 
stances. To  the  extent  to  which  interest  is  payment 
for  risk  incurred  in  surrendering  one's  capital  or 
savings  into  the  possession  and  control  of  another, 
it  is  just.  To  the  extent  to  which  it  is  reward  for 
the  sacrifice  involved  in  deferring  satisfactions  and 
exchanging  present  goods  for  future  goods,  it  is  also 
just.  But  what  would  the  rate  of  interest  normally 
be  in  an  industrial  and  civilized  society  if  these  two 


148  OUR  REVOLUTION 

items,  and  they  alone,  went  into  the  charge  called 
interest?  It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that,  if  there  be 
a  proper  charge  for  risk  incurred,  there  is  also  a 
charge  to  offset  it,  in  part  at  least,  the  charge  prop- 
erly made  for  taking  care  of  another's  capital.  It 
must  further  be  remembered  that  there  is  risk  in 
keeping  one's  savings  as  well  as  in  letting  another 
keep  them.  As  to  the  self-denial  involved  in  deferring 
pleasure  and  giving  up  present  goods  in  the  hope  of 
enjoying  future  goods,  it  should  not  be  forgotten 
that  it  is  not  purely  altruistic.  Ordinary  prudence 
and  foresight  will,  in  the  majority  of  cases,  impel  men 
to  save  and  provide  for  old  age  or  disability.  They 
need  not,  on  the  theory  under  consideration,  be  paid 
for  serving  themselves,  but  only  for  serving  others. 
Now,  the  trouble  is  that  they  are  paid  more  than 
their  service  to  others  'is  worth.  Interest,  in  short, 
is  a  sum  in  which  some  of  the  constituent  items  repre- 
sent something  other  than  risk  or  compensation  for 
social  service.  That  something  is  monopoly. 

Interest  would  be  just  if  it  were  absolutely  normal. 
It  could  only  be  normal  in  an  ideally — or  really — 
free  market,  in  an  economic  and  social  order  char- 
acterized by  equality  of  opportunity,  by  equality  of 
freedom,  by  the  total  absence  of  special  privilege,  of 
artificial  and  unjust  monopoly.  In  such  circum- 
stances as  these  capital  would  be  abundant,  for  more 
men  would  be  able  to  save  than  is  the  case  now.  Cap- 
ital would  compete  more  actively  for  investment  op- 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE  149 

portunities,  and  the  rate  of  interest  would  tend  to 
fall.  And  not  only  would  more  men  be  able  to  save, 
but  the  saving  would  involve  no  great  sacrifice. 
There  would  be  a  wider  diffusion  of  well-being,  of 
comfort.  Saving  would  not  mean  the  giving  up  of 
necessaries  or  of  the  things  we  regard  as  all  but 
necessary  to  decent  human  existence.  It  would  mean 
the  deferring  of  pleasures  and  gratifications  that  fall 
into  the  category  of  luxuries.  Naturally,  self-denial 
in  this  sense  would  require  and  receive  less  compen- 
sation than  the  abstinence  that  means  pain,  hard- 
ship, and  misery. 

Our  present  order  is  not  "free"  in  the  sense  in- 
tended by  the  classical  champions  of  healthy  and 
vigorous  competition  "in  a  fair  field."  The  field  is 
not  and  never  has  been  fair.  Land  and  other  natural 
opportunities  have  not  been  equally  accessible  to  all. 
It  is  hardly  necessary  to  speak  of  the  mediaeval  land 
tenures,  of  the  royal  gifts  of  vast  estates  to  favorites, 
of  violent  or  fraudulent  inclosures  of  common  lands, 
of  the  appropriation  of  mines  and  other  natural  or 
national  assets  by  small  groups.  It  is  sufficient  to 
allude  to  the  fact  that  even  in  the  United  States,  the 
land  "whose  other  name  is  opportunity,"  national 
assets  have  been  handed  over  to  the  few.  Conserva- 
tion and  the  fair  utilization  of  natural  assets  in  the 
interest  of  the  whole  nation  are  new  and  recent  "re- 
forms" in  the  sphere  of  American  politics.  It  is 
justly  felt  that  the  profligate  policy  that  has  been 


150  OUR  REVOLUTION 

thoughtlessly  followed  in  the  past  has  contributed  to 
the  great  evils  of  unmerited  poverty  and  involuntary 
idleness. 

Similarly,  every  unfair  privilege,  every  anti-social 
monopoly,  every  serious  social  abuse  permitted  or 
tolerated  by  law  and  society,  may  be  said  to  inure 
directly  or  indirectly  to  the  advantage  of  men  of 
property  and  capital.  They  command  higher  rates 
of  compensation  for  their  capital  because  of  the  in- 
ability of  so  many  thrifty  and  industrious  persons 
to  support  themselves  in  relative  comfort  and,  in  ad- 
dition, save  part  of  their  incomes  for  future  use  and 
enjoyment.  The  first  and  principal  remedy  for 
poverty,  according  to  Bastiat,  the  great  French  free- 
trade  economist,  and  his  school,  is  "abundance."  The 
modern  world  does  not  produce  enough,  in  spite  of 
all  our  inventions.  It  does  not  produce  enough  be- 
cause of  mediaeval  survivals,  of  antiquated  land 
tenures  and  laws,  of  indefensible  systems  of  taxation 
and  revenue.  And  a  society  that  does  not  produce 
enough  cannot  save  enough  to  devote  to  further  pro- 
duction ;  capital,  therefore,  is  dear  in  such  a  society 
and  interest  rates  are  higher  than  they  would 
"normally"  be. 

Nor  is  this  all.  Other  causes  contribute  to  the  ele- 
ment of  iniquity  and  injustice  that  is  vaguely  felt  to 
reside  in  interest.  The  interest  question  is,  and  has 
always  been,  largely  a  "money  question."  That  is 
to  say,  bad  and  unjust  banking  and  currency  ar- 


rangements  have  made  capital  dear  and  interest  rates 
high.  This  has  become  a  truism  in  our  own  day,  and 
we  have  been  reforming  our  currency  and  financial 
systems  for  the  recognized  and  avowed  purpose  of 
preventing  the  exploitation  of  industry  by  the  mo- 
nopolists of  credit  and  of  the  banking  power.  Presi- 
dent Wilson  has  used  very  vigorous  language  in  de- 
scribing the  effect  of  monopolized  credit  and  the 
need  of  "democratizing"  credit  and  enabling  men  of 
affairs  in  country  and  city  to  obtain  capital  at  rea- 
sonable rates.  What  has  been  done  by  national  legis- 
lation (notably  by  the  law  establishing  the  regional 
reserve  banks  and  authorizing  a  form  of  asset  bank- 
ing) is,  however,  merely  a  beginning.  Even  con- 
servative economists  are  now  advocating  legislation 
providing  for  the  organization  of  rural  credit  facili- 
ties on  a  cooperative  or  mutual  basis.  For  the  bulk 
of  ordinary  commercial  transactions  in  the  centers 
of  industry  and  trade,  additional  legislation  is  pro- 
posed in  the  direction  of  "asset  banking,"  or  the 
monetization  of  goods  of  certain  kinds  that  are  in- 
tended for  early  consumption. 

The  relation  between  capital  and  money — real  or 
representative,  hard  or  "soft" — is  a  difficult  subject 
that  has  engaged  the  attention  o£  economists  for 
many  years.  This  is  not  the  place  to  deal  with  it, 
but  it  may  be  pointed  out  that  the  drift  of  liberal 
opinion  among  economists  has  favored  the  view  that 
the  old  rigid  notion  regarding  the  comparative  unim- 


152  OUR  REVOLUTION 

portance  or  irrelevance  of  the  currency  question  in 
a  discussion  of  interest  was  utterly  unsound.  It  is 
true  that  the  man  who  wants  capital  for  productive 
purposes  pays  interest  for  capital,  not  for  money, 
which  is  nothing  but  a  means  to  his  end,  a  medium 
of  exchange.  It  is  true  that  the  manufacturer  who 
borrows  at  a  bank  really,  if  indirectly,  borrows  ma- 
chinery, tools,  iron  and  steel,  wood  and  brick.  The 
money  he  borrows  is  at  once  paid  out  by  him  in  the 
process  of  acquiring  commodities  and  enlarging  his 
plant  or  his  markets.  Still,  as  society  is  organized, 
the  manufacturer  cannot  borrow  capital.  He  must 
apply  to  the  go-between,  the  banker  or  the  money- 
lender, and  what  the  latter  can  or  will  do  to  accom- 
modate him  is  determined,  not  merely  by  the  state  of 
things  in  the  goods  or  capital  market,  but  also — 
and  sometimes  exclusively — by  the  state  of  things  in 
the  money  market.  A  money  panic  or  money  flurry 
is  not  necessarily  a  capital  panic  or  flurry.  A  money 
famine  does  not  imply  a  goods  famine  by  any  manner 
of  means. 

The  dangers  to  industry  and  commerce  that  re- 
sult from  the  inflation  of  the  currency,  or  from 
cheap  or  fiat  money,  have  been  dwelt  on  sufficiently. 
The  danger  of  contraction  of  the  currency  through 
causes  that  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  production 
and  movement  of  goods,  of  capital  available  for  fur- 
ther production,  has  not  received  nearly  the  atten- 
tion it  deserves.  For  decades  practically  all  the 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE  153 

measures  taken  to  safeguard  the  currency  were  anti- 
inflation  measures.  At  last  it  is  beginning  to  be 
realized  that  contraction  of  the  currency,  whether 
deliberate  or  accidental,  may  be  as  disastrous  as  in- 
flation. A  system,  or  a  set  of  banking  and  currency 
laws,  that  begets  periodical  money  panics  and 
flurries,  that  raises  interest  rates  absolutely  without 
reference  to  the  conditions  in  the  capital  market,  is 
bad  for  industry,  bad  for  all  legitimate  borrowers  of 
capital,  and  bad  for  labor. 

It  is  no  longer  denied  by  really  scientific  econo- 
mists that  the  interest  question  in  our  day  is  largely 
a  currency  and  banking  question,  and  even  to  some 
extent  a  question  of  standards  of  value  and  deferred 
payments.  The  advocates  of  a  multiple  standard  of 
value — from  Jevons  down — have  laid  proper  stress 
on  the  injustice  inherent  in  any  metallic  standard. 
The  victims  of  the  injustice  are  usually  the  borrowers 
and  the  toilers,  not  the  recipients  of  property  income 
in  the  shape  of  interest. 

If,  then,  crude,  unfair,  and  unscientific  banking 
and  currency  systems  have  favored  the  lenders  and 
oppressed  the  borrowers  and  the  entrepreneurs,  it 
follows  that  they  have  at  the  same  time,  and  in  the 
same  manner,  hampered  the  farmer,  the  mechanic, 
and  the  wage-worker.  This  is  another  way  of  say- 
ing that  interest  has  been  higher  than  it  would  have 
been  under  proper  conditions  and  enlightened  finan- 
cial legislation. 


154  OUR  REVOLUTION 

But  to  say  that  there  is  much  injustice  in  interest, 
and  that  true  progress  will  result  in  the  steady  low- 
ering of  the  rate  of  interest,  is  not  to  say  that  in- 
terest will  ever,  in  a  competitive  order,  reach  the  van- 
ishing-point. Capital  will  never  be  had  "for  the 
asking";  risk  and  self-denial  will  always  have  to  be 
paid  for.  But  abundance,  true  freedom,  and  equality 
of  opportunity,  with  a  rational  system  of  revenue 
and  high  taxation  of  private  land  held  out  of  use  for 
speculative  purposes,  will  combine  to  make  the  rate 
of  payment  small.  Again,  the  substitution  of  coop- 
eration for  competition  in  productive  and  distribu- 
tive industries — a  process  that,  admittedly,  is  cer- 
tain to  gain  steadily  in  momentum  as  well  as  in  scope 
and  breadth — must  also  contribute  more  and  more 
powerfully  to  the  reduction  of  the  charge  called  in- 
terest. Today  labor  has  to  intrust  its  savings  to 
'  corporations  and  institutions  that  are  used  almost 
exclusively  by  capitalists.  Cooperation  will  enable 
labor  to  make  productive  use  of  a  growing  part  of  its 
own  saved  capital. 

One  sometimes  hears  from  the  most  unterrified  so- 
cial radicals  the  admission  that  "under  existing  eco- 
nomic and  social  arrangements  interest  is  not  un- 
just." When  analyzed,  this  admission  amounts  to 
no  more  than  the  recognition  of  the  fact  that  he  who 
lends  capital  performs  a  service  to  the  borrower  of 
it  and  is  entitled  to  compensation  for  that  service, 
as  well  as  for  the  risk  incurred  by  him.  It  also  im- 


INCOME  AND  PRINCIPLE  OF  SERVICE   155 

plies,  however,  that,  as  evolutionists,  we  cannot  throw 
the  blame  for  the  element  of  injustice  in  interest  on 
the  possessors  of  capital  or  the  recipients  of  prop- 
erty income.  There  are  no  "conspiracies"  to  main- 
tain interest  or  to  prevent  its  decline.  Even  the 
bad  laws  that  have  hampered  industry  and  restricted 
opportunity  by  creating  an  artificial  scarcity  of 
money  and  credit  have  never  been  the  result  of  de- 
liberate conspiracies.  There  is  such  a  thing  as  class 
or  group  legislation  without  real  consciousness  of 
class  or  group  interest.  There  is  considerable  "rob- 
bery" in  interest,  but  the  recipients  of  interest  are 
not  deliberate  "robbers."  They  are  the  beneficiaries 
of  a  system  that  is  supported  by  most  of  us,  that  has 
been  sincerely  defended  by  good  and  able  men,  and 
that  is  even  now  so  defended  by  earnest  and  high- 
minded  thinkers.  The  system,  however,  as  Proudhon 
said  long  ago,  and  as  Professor  Nearing  shows  again, 
is  becoming  economically  "impossible."  Labor  and 
enterprise  cannot  carry  the  interest  burden  much 
longer.  It  will  have  to  be  lightened  and  lifted.  It  is, 
war  and  calamity  apart,  being  lightened  and  lifted. 
Only  so  much  of  it  will  continue  to  be  carried  as  is 
justified  and  sanctioned  by  the  principle  of  service. 


HOW  DEMOCRACY  FUNCTIONS 

"DEMOCRACY  is  inefficient.  Democracy  is  noisy, 
chaotic,  wilful.  It  dislikes  discipline,  and  is  unwill- 
ing to  recognize  and  submit  to  authority.  Fit  men 
are  distrusted  and  suspected  by  the  rank  and  file, 
and  they  seldom,  if  ever,  achieve  power.  Small  men, 
trimmers,  demagogues,  flatterers  of  the  crowd  get 
elected  to  office,  and  men  of  the  same  type  and  cali- 
bre obtain  the  appointive  offices.  Hence  democracy 
spells  waste,  jobbery,  incompetence  in  administra- 
tion of  public  affairs,  the  rule  of  the  inferior." 

This  indictment,  in  substantially  the  words  used, 
is  frequently  drawn  against  democracy,  not  only  by 
reactionaries  and  cynical  "neutrals,"  but  also  by 
men  who  believe  themselves  to  be  sound  and  faithful 
democrats.  Recently  certain  American  editors  have 
solemnly  moralized  on  the  alleged  significance  of 
the  fact  that  President  Wilson,  a  radical  Democrat, 
has  been  forced  to  call  to  his  aid  Republicans  and 
men  of  affairs  who  were  known  to  be  extremely  con- 
servative, who  were  closely  connected  with  Privilege 
or  Big  Business,  and  who  could  never  have  been  put 
in  charge  of  important  national  affairs  under  nor- 
mal conditions. 

156 


"See !"  these  editors  and  their  shallow  correspond- 
ents have  exclaimed,  "President  Wilson  found  that 
the  abilities  and  rare  gifts  of  men  like  Ryan,  Schwab, 
Stettinius,  Hurley,  Vanderlip,  et  al.,  had  to  be 
virtually  conscripted  in  order  to  organize  industry 
and  the  nation  for  the  successful  prosecution  of  the 
war.  A  great  crisis  permitted  the  President  to  dis- 
regard popular  prejudice  against  such  men,  and  we 
all  congratulate  ourselves  upon  our  good  fortune  in 
commanding  their  services.  Is  not  the  lesson  one 
we  should  take  to  heart  for  application  to  normal 
conditions?  Does  not  a  democracy  need  talent  and 
first-rate  capacity  at  all  times?  Away,  then,  with 
stupid  and  vulgar  prejudices  against  big  men;  let 
us  invite  the  supercapable  organizers  and  leaders, 
the  masterful  few,  to  govern  us  in  an  efficient,  eco- 
nomical and  scientific  way.  If  we  persist  in  our 
foolish  course  toward  ability,  disaster  sooner  or 
later  will  overtake  us.  Inefficient  democracy  cannot 
cope  with  efficient  militarism!" 

Half-truths  are  always  more  dangerous  than 
statements  wholly  devoid  of  truth  or  foundation.  Let 
us  analyze  the  foregoing  half-truths.  Is  democracy 
inefficient  in  the  long  run?  Suppose  we  grant  that 
a  particular  democracy  at  a  given  conjuncture  may 
be  unable  to  resist  and  defeat  a  predatory  military 
autocracy;  what  would  that  prove?  Nothing,  of 
course.  The  noblest  of  men  may  be  attacked  and 
killed  by  a  brutal  footpad,  but  no  sane  man  would 


158  OUR  REVOLUTION 

argue  on  that  ground  against  the  superiority  of  no- 
bility of  mind  and  character  over  brutal  might. 

In  the  long  run  democracy  is  quite  able  to  cope 
with  autocracy,  despite  the  mechanical  efficiency  and 
the  blind  discipline  on  which  the  latter  can  count. 
Democracies  submit  to  discipline  when  there  is  real 
necessity  for  it,  when  those  who  command  are  as  sin- 
cere as  those  who  obey,  and  when  arrogant  persons 
clothed  with  brief  authority  who  are  at  heart  anti- 
democratic are  replaced  by  commanders  who  know 
how  to  inspire  respect  and  admiration.  Democra- 
cies must  be  led ;  they  cannot  be  driven.  In  democra- 
cies the  rulers  must  know  how  to  create  public  sen- 
timent if  they  wish  to  lead  instead  of  be'ing  content 
to  follow.  In  democracies  agitation,  education  and 
discussion  must  precede  action.  The  process  may 
be  slow  at  times,  too  slow  to  please  the  extreme  left 
— or  the  extreme  right — but  who  has  the  right  to 
complain  of  this?  Democracy  is  government  by  dis- 
cussion, and  the  greater  the  variety  of  opinions  the 
greater  is  the  need  of  full  and  free  discussion.  The 
point  is  that  after  such  discussion  democracy  acts 
with  truly  amazing  unity,  energy  and  efficiency. 

Do  democracies  prefer  mediocre  men  to  fit,  strong, 
able  men?  Are  they  apt  to  be  misled  by  tricksters 
and  demagogues  ? 

It  is  true  that  sometimes  plausible  and  glib  talkers 
without  ability  or  sincerity  manage  to  get  into  office. 
It  is  true  that  men  with  showy  talents  are  sometimes 


HOW  DEMOCRACY  FUNCTIONS       159 

preferred  to  better  men  of  modest  disposition  who 
are  averse  to  self-advertising  and  the  crude  melo- 
dramatic incidents  of  the  average  electoral  cam- 
paign. It  is  true  that  democracy  does  not  mean 
the  rule  of  the  people  at  all  times  by  the  wise  and 
good.  But  what  of  all  this? 

The  remedy  for  the  mistakes  and  blunders  of  demo- 
cratic constituencies  is  to  be  found  in  one  thing  and 
one  thing  only — more  education,  but  more  educa- 
tion of  the  heart,  of  the  emotions,  as  well  as  of  the 
mind.  Education,  however,  is  not  a  matter  of  schools, 
sermons  and  newspapers.  You  cannot  educate  op- 
pressed, disinherited,  degraded,  servile  men.  You 
can  incite  their  passions  and  hatred,  you  can  stimu- 
late their  vague  resentment  and  bitterness,  but  this 
is  not  education,  and  it  does  not  make  for  social 
health  and  evolutional  progress.  Education  presup- 
poses opportunity,  leisure,  a  fair  degree  of  comfort 
and  economic  independence. 

A  great  British  liberal  once  said  that  the  cure  for 
the  evils  of  liberty  is  more  liberty.  The  cure  for 
the  ills  of  democracy  is  more  democracy,  and  the 
cure  for  the  shortcomings  of  political  democracy  is 
industrial  democracy. 

On  the  political  side  the  demands  of  the  democratic 
principle  are  satisfied  when  and  where  every  element, 
interest,  opinion  in  the  community  is  assured  of 
proper — that  is,  proportional — representation  in 
the  law-making  department  of  the  government. 


160  -OUR  REVOLUTION 

Whom  a  given  constituency  will  select  to  represent 
it  is  a  question  not  to  be  answered  in  the  abstract. 
We  know  that  there  are  "silk-stocking"  constituen- 
cies and  "plebeian"  constituencies.  In  certain  cities 
there  are  "hopeless  wards,"  wards  that  always  send 
spoils  politicians,  genial  saloon-keepers,  cheap  pro- 
fessionals to  the  city  council  or  the  popular  branch 
of  the  state  legislature.  Generally  speaking,  the  rep- 
resentatives fairly  represent  and  serve  the  constit- 
uency, and  when  they  betray  it,  as  they  do  not  in- 
frequently, the  constituency  is  not  aware  of  it,  for 
its  prejudices,  if  not  its  ignorance  and  indifference 
to  certain  questions,  render  it  blind  to  the  deeper 
issues  and  conflicts  of  the  community  of  which  they 
are  part.  For  example,  a  boodle  alderman  may  be 
returned  again  and  again  by  a  perfectly  honest  con- 
stituency that  would  never  approve  of  franchise 
selling  or  other  corrupt  deals.  The  constituency 
simply  does  not  believe  the  charges  against  its  alder- 
man, or  does  not  take  sufficient  interest  in  the  issue 
to  understand  it.  To  indict  men  wholesale,  as  many 
"good  people"  do,  is  to  do  it  injustice  through  igno- 
rance and  shallow  thinking.  There  are  few  depraved 
constituencies;  there  are  many  ignorant,  misled, 
easily  deceived  or  confused  constituencies. 

The  remarkable  fact  is  that,  in  spite  of  all  the 
drawbacks  from  which  democracies  suffer,  in  spite  of 
the  lack  of  opportunity,  education  and  leisure,  large 
democratic  constituencies  do  not  often  go  astray  in 


HOW  DEMOCRACY  FUNCTIONS       161 

politics.  The  demagogues  and  quacks  in  public  life 
are  few  and  far  between  where  the  people  have  real 
political  power.  The  British  House  of  Commons  to- 
day is  a  very  different  body  from  the  Commons  of 
the  rotten-borough  period  and  the  period  of  aristo- 
cratic, landlord  and  plutocratic  rule.  Who  will 
assert  that  Gladstone,  Morley,  Asquith,  Grey,  Lloyd 
George,  were  not,  or  are  not,  the  natural  and  fit 
representatives  of  liberal  and  democratic  England? 
Who  does  not  recognize  that  the  extension  of  the 
franchise  and  reforms  in  public  school  education 
made  possible  and  inevitable  the  rise  and  growth  of 
the  British  Labor  Party?  The  leaders  of  that  Party 
are  not  all  progressive ;  but  are  the  millions  of  work- 
ers represented  by  them  all  progressive? 

In  the  United  States  the  people  have  managed  to 
elect  a  surprising  number  of  able,  strong,  earnest, 
faithful  representatives  to  serve  and  lead  them.  We 
have  had  weak  and  mediocre  Presidents,  Senators, 
Governors  and  Congressmen.  We  have  many  small 
men  in  our  legislatures.  But  the  record  on  the  whole 
does  not  support  the  charge  that  democracies  are 
mean,  envious,  jealous  and  hostile  to  first-rate  abil- 
ity. The  names  of  Washington,  Adams,  Jefferson, 
Jackson,  Lincoln,  Tilden — who,  of  course  was 
elected,  though  not  seated — Cleveland,  and  Wilson 
furnish  an  argument  in  this  connection  that  scarcely 
requires  elaboration.  The  rolls  of  the  Senate  and 
House  furnish  similar  arguments.  If  in  late  years 


162  OUR  REVOLUTION 

there  has  been — as  there  has — a  deterioration  in  the 
average  character  and  intellectual  level  of  our  na- 
tional lawmakers,  industrial  conditions  largely,  if 
not  fully,  account  for  this  circumstance. 

The  notion  that  democracies  fear  and  distrust 
ability  and  genius  may  be  traced  to  certain  histori- 
cal illustrations  of  the  innate  conservatism  of  human 
beings  and  their  fear  of  disturbing  innovation.  The 
people  did  not  save  Jesus  of  Nazareth  from  cruci- 
fixion, though  they  had  the  opportunity  to  do  so. 
The  people  did  not  save  Socrates.  The  people  have 
stoned  or  burned  other  seers  and  reformers.  But  how 
fallacious  and  absurd  it  is  to  conclude  from  these 
historic  tragedies  that  democratic  government  is  less 
safe  or  efficient  than  other  forms!  Did  not  auto- 
crats, aristocracies  and  oligarchies  burn  and  slay 
religious  or  social  heretics,  men  ahead  of  their  day 
and  generation?  Have  men  of  exceptional  ability 
greater  opportunity  under  autocratic  than  under 
democratic  governments?  The  strong,  superior  men 
are  more  likely  to  lead  insurrections  and  revolution- 
ary movements — witness  Russia  under  the  czars ;  wit- 
ness Germany,  France,  Italy  and  Spain  during  the 
period  of  constitutional  and  revolutionary  agitation 
in  the  last  century — than  to  execute  the  will  of 
tyrants.  Besides,  class  rule  and  privilege  necessarily 
prevent  hosts  of  able  and  gifted  men  in  the  lower 
strata  from  developing  and  applying  their  superior 
faculties. 


HOW  DEMOCRACY  FUNCTIONS       163 

It  would  be  idle  to  idealize  average  human  nature 
and  to  deny  our  defects  and  shortcomings.  But 
that  human  nature,  as  history  and  our  own  ex- 
perience reveal,  in  some  way  militates  against  the 
success  of  democratic  forms  of  government  and  de- 
mands the  maintenance  or  restoration  of  unpopular, 
undemocratic  forms,  is  a  strange  and  bizarre  con- 
clusion indeed. 

What,  however,  about  the  "significant"  fact  that 
the  American  democracy  has  been  forced  by  the 
exigencies  of  the  war  to  seek  the  aid  of  cooperation 
of  men  that  otherwise  could  never  hope  to  get  into 
public  positions  of  power  and  responsibility?  What 
about  the  "conscription"  of  Messrs.  Schwab,  Ryan, 
Stettinius,  Vanderlip  and  others  of  the  same  set? 
Have  we  not  proof  conclusive  here  that  democracy 
keeps  able  men  at  arm's  length  and  calls  upon  them 
only  in  emergencies?  Does  it  not  follow  that  democ- 
racy would  be  bettejr  off  if  it  always  sought  and  wel- 
comed the  guidance  of  its  supercapable  ? 

Those  who  ask  such  questions  as  these  overlook 
one  important  fact — namely,  the  fact  that  the  super- 
capable  men  whom  they  have  in  mind  act  in  one  way 
under  normal  conditions  and  in  a  very  different  way 
under  the  strain  and  stress  of  war.  Democracies  are 
intelligent  enough  to  know  that  circumstances  alter 
cases.  The  Ryans  and  Schwabs  and  Vanderlips  are 
as  patriotic  as  any  other  group  of  citizens,  and  quite 
capable  of  wholly  disinterested  service  and  sacrifice. 


164  OUR  REVOLUTION 

As  a  rule,  they  will  scorn  to  take  selfish  advantage 
of  their  opportunities  in  war  time.  War  produces 
its  own  resources,  human  and  other.  It  transfigures 
men  and  revolutionizes  their  conduct,  but  only  be- 
cause they  are  placed  in  totally  different  circum- 
stances than  those  they  live  and  move  in  ordinarily. 
They  cannot  be  trusted  to  serve  the  people  disinter- 
estedly, and  take  democratic  views,  under  the  normal 
conditions.  Political  contests  and  fights  over  legis- 
lative projects  superabundantly  illustrate  this.  Mr. 
Schwab  would  not  be — was  not,  it  will  be  remembered 
— a  truthful,  impartial  adviser  of  Congress  in  tariff 
matters.  Mr.  Ryan  would  not  take  the  side  of  labor 
in  a  question  involving  the  issues  between  labor  and 
capital.  The  bankers  did  not  take  a  high-minded, 
impartially  scientific  view  of  the  federal  reserve  bill 
when  it  was  pending  in  Congress.  A  democratic  con- 
stituency naturally  prefers  to  be  represented  by  men 
who  are  not  identified  and  closely  allied  with  special 
interests  and  privilege.  No  sensible  student  of  poli- 
tics will  blame  it  or  affect  surprise  at  the  fact.  True, 
not  a  few  men  who  are  elected  because  they  are  sup- 
posed to  be  reasonably  impartial,  turn  out  to  be 
defenders  of  a  class  or  a  clique;  but  the  constit- 
uencies that  elect  such  men  generally  do  not  know 
their  secret  affiliations  and  real  sentiments. 

The  complaint  is  familiar  that  there  are  not 
enough  substantial  business  men  in  politics  and  pub- 
lic life;  but  the  fault  is  that  of  the  business  men. 


HOW  DEMOCRACY  FUNCTIONS       165 

They  act  and  talk  like  narrow-minded,  uninformed, 
prejudiced  men.  They  fail  to  inspire  confidence  and 
trust.  They  would  represent  their  own  set  or  class, 
and  under  our  system  the  direct,  frank,  undisguised 
representation  of  interests  is  neither  desired  nor 
intended.  The  men  whom  we  elect  know  how  to  court 
the  heterogeneous  constituency  and  attract  a  ma- 
jority composed  of  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  voters. 
Most  of  them  are  opportunists  and  followers  rather 
than  leaders,  but  they  are  on  the  whole  representative 
of  the  average  character  and  intelligence  of  their 
constituencies.  If  we  want  better  men,  we  must 
raise  the  level  of  the  constituencies.  The  voters  are 
the  masters,  and  we  must  continue  to  attend  to  the 
education  of  the  masters. 

It  is  not  true  that  democracy,  by  any  fair,  philo- 
sophical test  of  success,  has  proved  a  failure  as  com- 
pared with  autocracies.  But  it  is  true  that  to  be 
more  successful  than  it  is,  democracy  needs  more 
education,  more  honest  discussion,  more  genuine  free- 
dom and  justice  in  the  economic  sphere.  Political 
democracy  we  have  almost  realized — almost  but  not 
quite.  We  have  to  use  political  freedom  unremitting- 
ly and  methodically  to  realize  the  ideal  of  industrial 
democracy.  If  we  fail  to  win  that,  we  may  lose  even 
what  we  have  of  democracy  and  liberty. 


SHALLOW  ECONOMICS  FOR  THE  PEOPLE 

"EDUCATE  your  masters,"  said  Lord  Salisbury 
once  in  addressing  the  House  of  Lords,  the  "masters" 
being  the  generality  of  the  then  newly  enfranchised 
voters.  A  few  months  ago  Premier  Lloyd  George,  in 
discussing  labor  demands,  expressed  his  astonishment 
at  the  ignorance  of  elementary  economics  shown  by 
those  who  advocated  higher  wages  and  shorter  hours 
without  considering  the  inevitable  effect  of  such  steps 
on  the  prices  of  commodities  and  the  cost  of  living. 
Here  in  the  United  States  one  encounters  very  fre- 
quently the  doubtless  well-meant  admonition  of 
"great  editors"  that  the  masses  ought  to  have  politi- 
cal economy  and  its  essential  principles  brought 
home  to  them  somehow. 

It  will  hardly  be  disputed  that  millions  of  voters 
in  America,  England,  and  elsewhere  are  deplorably 
ignorant  of  economic  principles,  and  that  popular 
courses  in  economics  for  employers  as  well  as  em- 
ployes would  be  good  for  the  general  public. 

But  who  is  going  to  select  the  teachers,  the  ex- 
pounders of  economics?  How  are  we  to  make  sure 
that  the  economics  taught  and  illustrated  will  be 

166 


SHALLOW  ECONOMICS  167 

sound,  scientific  economics,  and  not  tainted,  "class 
conscious,"  or  bias-ridden  economics? 

Many  of  our  bankers,  manufacturers,  moralists, 
and  "great  editors" — or,  more  strictly,  editors  of 
great  and  influential  newspapers  and  periodicals — 
are  as  ignorant  of  economic  principles  as  the  wage 
workers  or  "hayseed"  farmers  they  would  fain  in- 
struct and  guide.  When  certain  labor  leaders  in 
England  took  the  ground  recently  that  wage-workers 
were  not  benefited  by  wage  increases  that  were  at 
once  shifted  to  the  consumers,  and  that  the  tradi- 
tional labor  policy  offered  no  way  out  of  the  vicious 
circles  of  higher-wages-higher-prices-higher-wages- 
higher-prices,  etc.,  only  some  radical  organs  hailed 
these  truly  significant  utterances  as  evidence  of  a 
better  and  firmer  grasp  of  economic  truth !  The 
great  editors  either  remained  discreetly  silent — as 
they  often  do,  when  the  resources  of  sophistry  fail — 
or  else  undertook  to  argue  that  the  aforesaid  "radi- 
cal" leaders  were  not  representative  of  union  labor 
in  England,  and  that  the  ordinary  trade  union  poli- 
cies were  quite  sufficient  unto  the  period! 

By  all  means  let  us  have  economics  for  the  public, 
provided  the  economics  be  sound  all  the  way  through. 
Shallow,  partisan,  made-to-order  economics  in  de- 
fense of  the  existing  order  would  be  worse  than  the 
ignorance  so  superciliously  talked  about  in  the  con- 
servative or  semi-liberal  press. 

Here  is  a  case  in  point. 


168  OUR  REVOLUTION 

The  Philadelphia  Saturday  Evening  Post  is  one 
of  the  liberal  weeklies  of  the  country.  It  has  a 
rather  intelligent  and  unusually  well  written  edi- 
torial page.  It  says  many  good  things.  But  its 
political  economy  is  often  "shaky,"  and  as  it  com- 
ments freely  on  current  affairs,  lectures  with  an  air 
of  scholarship  and  depth  on  the  fallacies  and  crudi- 
ties of  the  radical  schools,  its  unsound  economics  does 
considerable  harm  among  its  hosts  of  middle-class 
readers.  Of  late  it  has  had  a  deal  to  say  against 
socialism,  Lenine,  etc.,  but  its  attacks  are  not  limited 
to  forms  of  socialism.  They  are  directed  against 
radicalism  in  general.  They  attempt  no  real  analysis 
of  the  present  system  of  wealth  distribution.  They 
are  only  half  true,  and  half  truths  are  dangerous. 
They  sneer  at  the  radical  assaults  on  profiteers,  and 
assume  complacently  that  all  criticism  of  profiteers 
is  also  criticism  of  the  business  man  who  makes  a 
legitimate  profit. 

After  the  death  of  Woolworth  the  paper  in  ques- 
tion published  an  editorial  that  has  been  widely  re- 
printed. It  regarded  Woolworth's  case  as  typical 
and  said  of  him : 

He  had  no  monopoly  of  anything,  but  operated 
from  first  to  last  in  a  field  wide  open  to  competition. 
Indeed,  he  had  many  vigorous  and  able  competitors. 
Hardly  any  of  the  innumerable  articles  he  sold 
could  be  called  a  necessity  of  life.  Nobody  was  under 
the  slightest  compulsion  to  buy  a  penny's  worth  of 


SHALLOW  ECONOMICS  169 

goods  of  him.  Millions  did  buy  simply  because  they 
wanted  to  and  found  it  to  their  advantage.  By 
this  special  method  of  handling  a  certain  line  of 
goods  he  gave  them  a  better  penny's  worth  than  they 
had  got  before,  or  they  would  not  have  flocked  to 
him.  No  sane  mind  can  avoid  that  conclusion.  His 
patrons  must  have  profited  while  he  profited,  or  he 
could  not  have  held  them  a  day. 

Bj'  socialist  logic — and  the  logic  of  those  who 
teach  socialism  without  admitting  it — somebody  must 
have  been  poorer  because  this  man  was  finally  $30,- 
000,000  richer.  But  who,  in  fact,  was  poorer?  He 
invented  or  developed  a  new  contact  between  produc- 
tion and  consumption,  made  it  easier,  for  example, 
to  get  clothespins  and  mousetraps.  The  natural  pre- 
sumption is  that  the  effect  of  his  operations  was  to 
raise  wages  by  creating  new  demands  for  labor,  and 
at  the  same  time  to  cheapen  goods  to  the  consumer. 

Now,  if  the  writer  and  the  editor  merely  intended 
to  prove  that  under  the  existing  system,  despite  the 
monopolies  and  special  privileges  that  abound  on 
every  side,  it  is  still  possible  to  make  millions  in  the 
competitive  field,  and  that,  therefore,  not  all  big  for- 
tunes are  ascribable  to  legal  privilege  and  unjust 
arrangements,  the  argument  would  be  fairly  sound, 
in  the  main.  Not  altogether,  but  in  the  main.  For 
when  the  editorial  asks,  "who  in  fact  was  poorer?" 
it  forgets  that  even  a  Woolworth  may  swell  profits 
by  exploiting  his  employes  and  paying  them  less 
than  a  fair  wage.  Exploited  employes  are  certainly 
"poorer"  because  the  millionaire  employer  underpaid 


170  OUR  REVOLUTION 

them.  Ah,  yes,  he  paid  market  prices  for  labor,  but 
what  factors  and  influences  determine  these  market 
prices  ?  If  monopoly  and  privilege  force  wages  down 
and  keep  them  down — and  this  is  undeniable — then 
the  employer  of  genius,  or  exceptional  ability,  who, 
though  not  directly  a  beneficiary  of  monopoly  and 
privilege,  is  able  to  underpay  labor,  is  indirectly  a 
beneficiary  of  said  monopoly  and  privilege.  To  vin- 
dicate the  Woolworths  entirely,  it  is  necessary  to 
prove  that  they  do  not  take  advantage  of  monopoly 
and  privilege,  and  pay  labor  a  just  wage  despite  the 
market  rates  they  find  ready  made.  How  many  mil- 
lionaire employers  can  be  so  vindicated?  Of  course, 
business  is  not  charity,  and  the  employer  can  plead 
that  he  is  not  responsible  for  the  system  that  confers 
illegitimate  advantages  upon  him.  This  is  true 
enough;  but  it  is  irrelevant  to  the  main  issue  under 
discussion,  namely,  the  clear,  untainted,  honest  title 
to  the  millions  made  in  "competitive"  industry. 

Again,  if  the  editorial  had  argued  that  the  en- 
lightened radical  should  not  attack  profits  as  such, 
but  should  differentiate  between  profits  that  repre- 
sent reward  for  ability,  management,  genius,  and 
profits  due  to  exploitation  of  labor  or  to  monopoly 
and  privilege,  it  would  have  been  wholly  and  emine"nt- 
ly  sound.  But  while  it  alludes  to  monopolies  and 
artificial  privileges,  it  does  not  recognize  the  neces- 
sity and  justice  of  making  war  on  them  and  doing 
away  with  them.  It  does  not  urge  a  free  field  and  no 


SHALLOW  ECONOMICS  171 

favors.  It  does  not  plead  for  equality  of  oppor- 
tunity and  of  liberty,  and  for  the  proper  reward  of 
merit  and  ability.  It  darkens  counsel  by  emphasiz- 
ing the  exceptional  case  of  the  employer  who  makes 
millions  in  the  "free  field" — though  the  field  is  never 
free — and  by  tacitly  belittling  the  importance  of 
monopolies  and  special  privileges. 

Here  is  another  instance  in  point : 

George  E.  Roberts,  a  New  York  banker  and  a  per- 
suasive writer  on  financial  questions,  has  been  dis- 
cussing the  labor  situation  and  the  demands  for  high- 
er wages  and  for  more  democratic  control  of  indus- 
try. He  urges  increased  production  as  a  remedy  for 
high  prices,  emphasizes  the  essentially  cooperative 
character  of  modern  industry,  tells  labor  that  its 
position  is  "constantly  becoming  stronger"  by  rea- 
son of  the  accumulation  of  capital.  He  advocates 
fair  play  in  general  terms  alike  for  labor  and  capi- 
tal. But  he  does  not  even  mention  privilege  and  mo- 
nopoly. He  sees  no  connection  between  scarcity  and 
landlordism  or  the  locking  up  of  natural  opportuni- 
ties. He  ignores  the  fact  that  "cooperative  indus- 
try" may  be  exploited  and  bled  by  parasitic  bene- 
ficiaries of  indefensible  special  privileges.  He  con- 
veys the  wrong  impression  that  it  is  the  trade  union, 
with  its  insistence  on  shorter  hours  and  adequate 
wages,  which  restricts  production  and  thus  raises 
costs.  That  abundance  may  and  should  be  created 
in  modern  society  without  overworking  the  laborer  or 


172  OUR  REVOLUTION 

underpaying  him,  that  injustice  and  exploitation  are 
not  necessary  to  abundance  or  cheapness,  and  that 
democratic  management  of  industry  under  equality 
of  opportunity  may  actually  tend  to  produce  abund-t 
ance  and  decrease  the  cost  of  production,  are  consid- 
erations totally  overlooked  by  Mr.  Roberts.  His 
essays,  however  interesting,  are  therefore  misleading. 
Nothing  is  gained  in  the  long  run  by  fallacious 
reasoning  and  special  pleading.  Unsound  economics 
from  the  side  of  the  employing  class  will  provoke 
equally  unsound  economics  from  certain  would-be 
leaders  of  the  working  classes.  The  only  safe  and 
intelligent  policy  is  to  ascertain  the  truth  and  to 
teach  it  regardless  of  consequences  to  present  bene- 
ficiaries of  those  features  in  our  social-economic  sys- 
tem that  are  based  on  false  and  erroneous  ideas  or 
else  are  manifestly  wrong  and  have  to  be  defended 
by  sophistry  and  specious  argumentation. 


SOCIALISM  RECOGNIZES  ITS  MISTAKES 

THERE  are  new  and  healthy  tendencies  in  Socialism 
which  radicals  of  the  individualist  or  libertarian  type 
should  be  the  first  to  identify  and  welcome.  No  doubt 
some  of  the  narrow-minded  Socialists  will  seek  to 
belittle  the  tendencies  in  question  and  to  deny  that  a 
change  has  come  over  the  spirit  of  the  speculations 
and  plans  of  their  school,  but  the  scientific  and 
unprejudiced  student  of  social  reform  is  not  likely 
to  be  impressed  by  such  denials.  What  is  taking 
place  in  the  Socialist  camp  is  of  the  utmost  signifi- 
cance. 

There  was  a  time  when  socialism  was  frankly,  if 
not  cynically,  bureaucratic.  It  sneered  at  personal 
liberty.  It  saw  nothing  in  individualism  save  the 
mask  of  a  discredited  group  of  special  pleaders  who 
defended  the  iniquitous  privileges  and  flagrant 
abuses  of  the  present  social  order.  If  you  were  not 
a  Socialist,  if  you  expressed  fear  of  the  all-powerful 
State  and  the  ubiquitous  official  regulator  and  in- 
spector, you  were  a  plutocrat.  Socialism  was  the 
euphemism  for  State  ownership  and  operation  of  all 
industry,  State  control  of  the  means  of  production, 
and  State  control  of  all  the  channels  of  communica- 

173 


174  OUR  REVOLUTION 

tion  and  publicity.  The  individual  had  no  rights 
which  the  majority  was  bound  to  respect.  Of  course, 
the  Socialists  always  assured  us,  in  general  terms, 
that  the  individual  would  be  infinitely  freer  under 
their  regime  than  he  was  or  ever  could  be  under  capi- 
talism and  free  competition;  but  specifications  and 
proofs  were  never  furnished.  There  was  scorn  for 
the  "pseudo-radical"  who  demanded  guaranties  for 
the  individual — for  the  spirit,  the  personality,  the 
dignity,  and  the  independence  of  the  human  unit. 

This  attitude  on  the  part  of  the  so-called  Scien- 
tific Socialists,  the  Marxians  and  semi-Marxians, 
could  not  fail  to  arouse  formidable  opposition  even 
in  circles  that,  on  the  whole,  were  disposed  to  accept 
the  cardinal  doctrines  and  main  proposals  of  so- 
cialism. Fabian  Socialism  in  England,  the  revisionist 
movement  in  Germany,  Syndicalism  in  France  and 
Italy,  Guild  Socialism,  Communistic  Anarchism,  In- 
dividualist Anarchism  have  all  grown  up  largely  as 
a  result  of  deep  dissatisfaction  with  orthodox  so- 
cialism and  the  artificiality,  rigidity,  and  tyranny  it 
appeared  to  involve.  The  destructive  criticism  of 
orthodox  socialism  from  so  many  quarters — all  radi- 
cal— slowly  and  almost  imperceptibly  caused  little 
groups  of  the  faithful  here  and  there  to  modify  their 
creed  and  shift  their  ground.  A  veritable  landmark 
was  the  late  Edmond  Kelly's  "Twentieth  Century 
Socialism"  (1910),  in  which  State  Socialism  was 
repudiated  and  the  reader  assured  that  the  socializa- 


SOCIALISM  RECOGNIZES  ITS  MISTAKES  175 

tion  of  industry  would  "practically  consist  of  a 
transfer  of  the  same  from  the  hands  of  the  capitalist 
to  the  hands  of  those  actually  engaged  therein" ;  that 
fair  compensation  would  be  paid  to  the  capitalists ; 
that  only  the  idle,  parasitic  stockholder  would  be 
eliminated,  and  that  gently;  and,  finally,  that  in 
each  industry  a  certain  amount  of  private  enterprise 
and  competition  might  or  would  be  preserved  in  or- 
der to  keep  the  socialized  factories  or  mills  or  re- 
fineries on  their  good  behavior.  Mr.  Kelly  pictured 
a  cooperative  commonwealth  in  which  the  State  had 
little  more  power  than  that  enjoyed  by  the  British 
Government  today,  under  a  so-called  individualist 
system.  And  he  added  that  the  kind  of  socialism 
he  contemplated  "need  not  be  introduced  by  any 
sudden  transfer  of  political  power  whatever." 

In  these  remarkable  views  Mr.  Kelly  was  supported 
by  other  American  and  "naturalized"  Socialists  who, 
under  Anglo-Saxon  influences  and  by  reason  of  eco- 
nomic changes  that  had  exposed  some  of  the  fallacies 
of  dogmatic  Marxism,  emphasized  their  disbelief  in 
violence,  on  the  one  hand,  and  in  State  despotism  or 
bureaucratic  stagnation  and  uniformity,  on  the 
other. 

However,  these  utterances,  though  significant,  pro- 
duced little  impression  on  the  opponents  of  socialism. 
Syndicalism  continued  to  flourish.  Guild  Socialism 
gained  new  converts  and  individualist  radicals  re- 
mained hostile  to  the  whole  Socialist  movement. 


176  OUR  REVOLUTION 

The  great  war  came.  State  socialism,  under  the 
spur  of  military  necessity,  advanced  by  leaps  and 
bounds.  Industries  were  taken  over,  or  regulated, 
and  managed  by  bureaucrats.  Neither  the  employers 
nor  the  employees  relished  the  methods  of  the  bureau- 
crats. The  armistice  brought  with  it  loud  demands 
for  the  "freeing  of  industry."  The  movement  for 
nationalization  and  municipalization  of  these  or 
those  utilities  or  industries  suffered  a  severe  setback. 
Reactionaries  with  limited  capacity  for  thought  are 
jubilant.  But  the  Socialists,  too,  have  abundant 
food  for  reflection.  There  is  evidence  that  they  are 
not  neglecting  their  duty  or  opportunity — that  they 
are  searching  their  intellectual  consciences  and  recog- 
nizing the  necessity  of  purging  their  movement  even 
more  rigorously  than  before  the  war  of  the  offensive 
elements  of  coercion,  Statism,  bureaucracy. 

Emile  Vandervelde,  the  eminent  Belgian  Socialist 
leader,  has  just  published  a  little  book  entitled  "So- 
cialism versus  the  State."  The  author's  intention 
is  to  remind  us  of  the  Spencerian  attacks  on  the 
State,  Socialist  or  other,  in  the  name  of  the  individ- 
ual, and  on  absolute  majority  rule  in  the  name  of 
minority  and  personal  rights.  The  thesis  of  the 
little  volume  is  that  socialism  is  diametrically  op- 
posed to  Statism ;  that  modern  Socialists  do  not  wor- 
ship the  State  and  do  not  contemplate  the  undue, 
unnecessary  subjection  of  the  minority  to  the  ma- 
jority, or  the  individual  to  the  whole,  and  that,  far 


SOCIALISM  RECOGNIZES  ITS  MISTAKES  177 

from  seeking  to  place  an  omnipotent  bureaucracy  in 
control  of  industry,  socialism  spells  the  overthrow 
of  the  existing  bureaucracy  and  proposes  "the  or- 
ganization of  social  labor  by  the  workers  grouped  in 
public  associations." 

Vandervelde  quotes  with  entire  approval  the  fol- 
lowing plank  from  the  platform  of  the  French  Parti 
Ouvrier:  "Operation  of  State  factories  to  be  in- 
trusted to  the  laborers  who  work  in  them." 

It  is  not  necessary  to  stop  to  analyze  these  affirma- 
tions, contentions,  and  disclaimers.  The  purpose  of 
this  article  is  merely  to  direct  attention  to  certain 
symptomatic  and  gratifying  tendencies  in  modern 
socialism.  They  are  tendencies,  to  repeat,  that  can- 
not fail  to  interest  progressives  and  radicals  of  every 
school.  They  are  tendencies  that  should  be  en- 
couraged and  welcomed,  for  at  the  end  of  the  road 
there  may  be  the  promise  of  a  reconciliation  between 
evolutionary,  rational  socialism  and. consistent,  sin- 
cere, philosophical  individualism. 

The  great  mistake  of  the  orthodox  Socialists  con- 
sisted in  exaggerating  the  importance  of  mere  ma- 
chinery, institutionalism,  artificial  arrangements  and 
contrivances.  They  constantly  attacked  the  wrong 
side.  They  blamed  freedom  for  the  fruits  of  privi- 
lege, competition  for  the  results  of  monopoly.  They 
stressed  cooperation,  and  voluntary  cooperation  is 
an  excellent  thing  that  can  hardly  be  carried  too  far 
in  production,  distribution,  exchange  of  services.  To 


178  OUR  REVOLUTION 

get  rid  of  the  State,  in  the  proper  sense  of  the 
phrase,  is  to  get  rid  of  the  artificial  and  unjust 
inequalities  and  privileges  supported  by  the  State. 
Abolish  these,  recover  or  open  up  opportunities,  pre- 
vent exploitation  and  economic  slavery,  and  little 
will  be  left  in  the  State  to  condemn.  Cooperation  on 
a  wide  scale  will  be  practiced  without  legal  compul- 
sion— from  self-interest  and  natural  human  socia- 
bility. 

Is  it  too  much  to  ask  the  broader  and  more  liberal 
Socialists  to  put  aside  for  a  time  their  vague  plans 
for  the  future  cooperative  commonwealth  and  aid 
the  non-Socialist  and  the  individualist  radicals  in 
the  active  campaign  against  privilege,  land  and  trade 
monopolies,  and  other  violations  of  the  basic  demo- 
cratic principle  of  equality  of  opportunity  and  of 
liberty? 


A  NEGLECTED  OPPORTUNITY  AND  DUTY 
IN  JOURNALISM 

IN  two  papers  that  have  appeared  in  this  j  ournal  * 
the  present  writer  has  discussed  the  actual  and  pos- 
sible role  of  the  modern  newspaper  in  the  political 
and  moral  life  of  the  people — or  in  the  education  of 
the  great  reading  public.  The  shortcomings  of  the 
average  commercial  newspaper  were  touched  upon, 
but  the  conclusion  that  was  reached  was,  on  the 
whole,  by  no  means  as  cheerless  and  pessimistic  as 
that  of  many  severe  critics  of  contemporary  journal- 
ism. Independent,  honest,  and  high-minded  jour- 
nalism, the  writer  firmly  believes,  is  entirely  possible, 
and  in  no  wise  incompatible,  moreover,  with  "enter- 
prise," readableness,  and  popularity. 

But  to  say  that  such  journalism  is  possible  even 
on  a  commercial  basis — to  say,  in  other  words,  that 
a  publisher  need  not  sacrifice  reasonable  profits  to 
dignity,  moral  courage,  and  righteousness — is,  of 
course,  not  to  say  that  the  actual  supply  of  honest 
and  independent  journalism  is  even  approximately 
equal  to  the  demand  for  it.  The  truth  is,  not  many 

1  See  especially  the  paper  entitled  "Is  an  Honest  and  Sane 
Newspaper  Press  Possible?"  American  Journal  of  Sociology, 
November,  1909. 

179 


180  OUR  REVOLUTION 

of  our  newspapers  answer  the  reasonable  require- 
ments of  the  intelligent  and  decent  elements  of  the 
community.  Only  a  few  do  this;  the  majority  leave 
much  to  be  desired.  Some  are  too  sensational ;  others 
are  erratic  and  unstable.  Many  are  utterly  indiffer- 
ent to  the  questions  that  really  matter,  in  the  long 
run,  simply  because  the  average  person  is  supposed 
to  be  indifferent  to  them.  In  the  handling  of  politi- 
cal, civic,  industrial,  and  social  news,  few  of  the  big 
newspapers  even  pretend  to  adhere  to  any  standard, 
or  to  care  for  method  and  consistency.  The  per- 
sonal, the  trivial,  the  cheap,  the  "yellow"  incidents 
are  generally  exploited  at  the  expense  of  the  sub- 
stantial and  serious  matters  that  underlie  the  news. 
The  unpardonable  sin,  the  intolerable  thing,  in  com- 
mercial journalism  is  "dulness,"  and  absolutely  ev- 
erything is  ruthlessly  sacrificed  to  "dramatic,  human 
interest,"  to  "breeziness"  or  "appeal."  And,  of 
course,  the  managing  editors  and  their  reporters  and 
copy-readers  always  think  of  interest  and  appeal 
in  terms  of  crowds  and  multitudes.  Hence  sensa- 
tional or  melodramatic  items  will,  at  the  last  moment, 
displace  and  "kill"  important  but  "dry"  civic,  ad- 
ministrative, or  political  matter  that  is  appreciated 
only  by  small  groups  of  citizens  and  readers. 

It  is  a  fact  which  hardly  requires  further  elabora- 
tion that  our  greatest  commercial  newspapers  can- 
not really  be  depended  upon  to  "give  the  news." 
Their  boast  in  this  respect  is  totally  unfounded. 


A  NEGLECTED  OPPORTUNITY       181 

They  give  certain  news,  and  give  it  without  system 
or  method.  They  omit  and  suppress  other  news 
with  equal  capriciousness  and  lack  of  any  definite 
policy  save  the  one  avowed  policy  of  making  the 
whole  paper  as  exciting  and  lively  as  possible.  Cer- 
tain Chicago  papers  recently  suppressed  a  grand 
jury  report  which  criticized  sensationalism  and 
charged  journalism  with  responsibility  for  juvenile 
criminality. 

To  this  familiar  complaint  against  contemporary 
journalism  there  must  be  added  the  even  more  grave, 
if  perhaps  less  common,  complaint  of  deliberate  un- 
fairness, class  bias,  and  political  or  factional  par- 
tisanship in  handling  news.  This  complaint  is  made 
against  the  national  news  agencies  as  well  as  against 
individual  papers.  Many  social  workers,  labor  lead- 
ers, and  progressive  thinkers  feel  that  big  business, 
big  finance,  and  capitalism  unduly  control  the  news 
machinery  of  the  country.  This  control,  they  be- 
lieve, results  in  much  injustice,  and  in  prejudice  and 
confusion  of  vital  issues.  The  Colorado  mining  strike 
is  usually  cited  as  an  illustration  of  the  unfairness  of 
the  news  agencies.  The  way  in  which  the  hearings, 
by  a  Senate  subcommittee,  on  the  appointment  of  Mr. 
Brandeis  to  the  federal  Supreme  Court  were  treated 
or  "digested"  and  "summarized"  in  the  press  reports 
is  another  illustration  furnished  in  certain  "ad- 
vanced" circles.  The  writer's  own  opinion  is  that  the 
unfairness  of  the  press  associations  is  the  result 


182  OUR  REVOLUTION 

rather  of  narrow  ideas  and  ignorance  than  of  delib- 
erate prejudice,  or  of  the  conscious  desire  to  pander 
to  the  monopolistic  elements  of  the  country.  That, 
however,  unfairness  there  is,  can  hardly  be  doubted. 
Now,  the  probability  of  press  reform  in  these  di- 
rections is  very  faint.  Practically  every  factor  in 
contemporary  journalism  militates  against  reform. 
How  many  of  our  big  newspapers  are  published  and 
controlled  by  men  who  love  journalism,  have  lofty 
professional  ideals,  glory  in  good  work  worthily  done, 
and  realize  the  responsibility  that  rests  upon  them? 
After  all,  a  newspaper  is  what  the  owner  chooses  to 
make  it.  A  man  of  principle,  of  intelligence,  of 
self-respect,  of  poise,  will  run  one  kind  of  a  news- 
paper. He  will,  first  of  all,  run  a  newspaper  in  which 
the  editorial  expressions  of  opinion  will  be  scrupu- 
lously differentiated  from  the  presentation  of  facts 
in  the  news  columns.  He  will  not  color,  or  manipu- 
late, either  news  or  the  headlines.  He  will  demand 
strict  honesty  and  impartiality  of  his  reporters,  cor- 
respondents, and  desk  men.  He  will  give  all  sides 
worth  giving.  He  will  insist,  first  and  last,  on  fur- 
nishing the  raw  material  of  opinion  to  all  his  read- 
ers— of  carrying  knowledge  to  them,  and  of  carrying 
the  power  that  goes  with  knowledge.  His  own  views 
he  will  state  candidly  and  vigorously,  but  he  will 
state  them  as  his  own  views,  and  neither  claim  to 
know  what  public  opinion  is  when  he  does  not  know  it, 
and  has  no  means  of  knowing  it,  nor  assume  to  re- 


A  NEGLECTED  OPPORTUNITY       183 

fleet  the  opinions  of  the  many  publics  that  make  up 
the  great  public. 

But  how  many  men  of  principle,  of  self-respect,  of 
dignity  and  ability,  run  newspapers?  We  have  men 
who  are  in  the  business  for  profit.  We  have  men  who 
are  in  it  because  they  are  vain,  ambitious,  pushful. 
We  have  men  in  the  business  who  have  political  axes 
to  grind,  who  have  friends  in  public  life  whom  they 
wish  to  advertise  and  "boom."  We  have  men  in  the 
business  who  love  power  and  notoriety.  We  have  men 
in  the  business  who  use  their  papers  as  adjuncts  to 
financial  promotion  and  speculation.  Finally,  we 
have  men  in  the  business  who,  though  personally  un- 
fit for  it,  have  succeeded  fathers  or  grandfathers  of 
conspicuous  fitness  for  journalism,  and  who  live  on 
past  reputation  and  past  prestige. 

We  can  no  more  expect  genuine  journalistic  re- 
form from  these  types  of  publishers  and  editors  than 
we  can  expect  the  proverbial  silken  purses  from  sows' 
ears.  The  style,  verily,  is  the  man.  The  newspaper, 
to  repeat,  and  its  style,  from  headlines  and  offensive, 
nauseating  self-advertising  up  to  the  editorial  man- 
ner and  the  mode  of  presenting  news,  reflect  the  pro- 
prietor's mental  and  moral  traits. 

Nor  is  this  all.  The  basic  material  conditions  of 
contemporary  journalism  are  fatally  unsound.  Jour- 
nalism that  is  too  "cheap"  to  be  self-supporting  as 
journalism  cannot  be  satisfactory.  Newspapers  that 
cannot  make  their  ends  meet  without  heavy,  abun- 


184  OUR  REVOLUTION 

dant  advertising,  and  to  which  circulation  is  merely 
a  means  to  advertising,  cannot  be  independent,  sober, 
and  honest.  They  are  under  the  constant  necessity 
of  "splurging,"  of  trafficking  in  rumors  and  false 
reports,  of  making  mountains  out  of  molehills.  And 
this  in  turn  carries  with  it  the  necessity  of  rigorous 
economy  in  handling  news  that  cannot  possibly  be 
rendered  sensational  and  exciting.  Inexperienced 
and  uneducated  reporters  are  too  often  assigned  to 
"cover"  civic  and  local  news  of  moment.  The  ability 
and  the  experience  available  in  the  office  are  required 
elsewhere. 

Has  not  the  time  come  to  revive  definitely  the  idea 
— vaguely  broached  years  ago — of  privately  en- 
dowed newspapers? 

We  have  various  "foundations"  for  education,  for 
research,  for  progressive  philanthropy,  for  certain 
social  and  industrial  reforms.  They  are  indispen- 
sable. We  know  that  higher  arts,  the  higher  music, 
could  not  exist  without  liberal  endowment.  Is  it  not 
sufficiently  clear  that  sound,  clean,  and  dignified 
journalism  cannot  hope  to  take  root,  to  establish 
itself  in  modern  cities,  without  at  least  temporary 
endowment  ? 

It  is  idle,  of  course,  to  expect  municipal  or  state 
endowment  of  journalism.  The  remedy,  were  it  prac- 
ticable, would  prove  worse  than  the  disease.  The 
endowment  of  a  newspaper,  or  chain  of  newspapers, 
by  a  single  multimillionaire,  or  group  'of  multimil- 


A  NEGLECTED  OPPORTUNITY       185 

lionaires,  would  undoubtedly  also  prove  vain  or  un- 
desirable. The  policies  of  such  newspapers  would 
either  actually  be  controlled  and  dictated  by  the  rich 
patrons,  or  else  the  general  public  would  suspect 
such  control  and  dictation.  Such  suspicions,  even  if 
unfounded,  would  be  fatal.  Newspapers  supported 
by  any  of  the  existing  "foundations,"  for  example, 
would  become  targets  for  all  manner  of  attacks  and 
misrepresentation. 

But  we  are  by  no  means  limited  to  this  form  or 
mode  of  endowment.  If  it  be  admitted  that  the  edu- 
cation of  our  democratic  masses  cannot  be  safely  left 
to  commercialized  newspapers ;  if  it  be  admitted  that 
it  is  desirable  to  set  up  and  maintain  standards  of 
journalism — intellectual  and  moral;  if  it  be  admitted 
that  it  would  be  a  boon  to  a  community  to  have  a 
great,  trustworthy,  vital,  honest,  ably  edited,  and 
ably  written  newspaper,  and  that  gradually  the  in- 
fluence of  such  a  newspaper  would  make  itself  felt 
even  in  the  worst  of  the  commercialized  newspapers — 
if  all  these  things  be  admitted — and  the  writer  does 
not  believe  that  there  is  serious  doubt  as  to  them — 
then  it  must  be  admitted  that  there  is  no  insur- 
mountable obstacle  in  the  way  of  a  reasonable  and 
carefully  safeguarded  endowment  plan. 

Tentatively,  and  in  order  to  provide  a  basis  of 
discussion,  to  elicit  suggestion  and  criticism,  the 
writer  submits  the  following  outlines  of  a  plan: 

1.  Organize  a  national  foundation  for  the  special 


186  OUR  REVOLUTION 

and  sole  purpose  of  establishing  a  chain  of  absolutely 
independent  and  sober-minded  newspapers  in  the  big 
cities  of  the  country. 

2.  Appeal  not  only  to  men  and  women  of  great 
wealth,  but  to  persons  of  moderate  fortunes,  or  even 
of  small  means — small,  that  is,  for  our  day,  but  not 
too   small  to  permit  indulgence  in  an  intellectual, 
moral  and  artistic  luxury — to  become  contributors 
or  supporters  of  this  newspaper  foundation. 

3.  Enlist  progressive  and  honorable  business  men, 
professional  men,  educators,  labor  leaders,  journal- 
ists, social  workers,  authors,  artists,  and  others,  and 
organize  a  national  board  of  trustees  representing 
these  several  elements  of  the  community  to  direct  the 
foundation. 

4.  Organize  a  smaller  but  representative  board  in 
each  city  where  one  of  the  proposed  newspapers  is  to 
be  started. 

5.  Adopt  and  prescribe  a  definite  and  practical 
news  policy  for  the  proposed  chain  of  newspapers. 
That  is,  decide  how  to  handle  news  relating  to  vice 
and  crime,  to  family  scandal,  to  sport,  to  trivial 
gossip,  and  the  like. 

6.  Proclaim  an  absolutely  non-partisan  editorial 
policy.    Announce  that  all  controversial  and  conten- 
tious questions — Mexico,  for  example,  or  the  mean- 
ing of  neutrality  in  connection  with  the  great  world- 
war?  or  the  submarine  and  its  uses,  or  the  trade  in 
arms  and  ammunition — will  be  frankly  treated  as 


A  NEGLECTED  OPPORTUNITY       187 

such.  That  is,  while  the  editorial  columns  of  the 
journal  will  present  the  views  of  the  editor  or  edi- 
torial board,  other  columns  will  be  opened  to  writers 
of  authority  and  standing  for  the  sober  presentation 
of  differing  views;  nay,  that  care  will  be  taken  to 
secure  the  timely  presentation  of  divergent  views,  so 
that  the  reader  may  have  before  him  the  best  state- 
ments of  the  several  points  of  view  actually  occupied 
with  reference  to  any  important  question. 

7.  Organize  an  editorial  board  in  every  city  repre- 
sented in  the  proposed  chain,  but  at  the  same  time 
let  one  responsible  managing  editor  be  selected  and 
engaged,  and  let  ample  power  be  vested  in  him  for 
all  ordinary  journalistic  purposes. 

8.  Charge  a  "living  price"  for  the  paper — two  or 
three  cents  a  copy,  if  necessary — and  let  circulation 
grow  naturally  in  response  to  the  appeal  of  an  inde* 
pendent,  reliable,  well-written,  progressive,  and  wide- 
awake newspaper. 

9.  Do  not  exclude  advertising — except,  of  course, 
quack  and  immoral  advertising — but  do  not  solicit  it. 
Let  it,  too,  come  naturally,  as  a  recognition  of  the 
value  of  the  journal  as  a  business  medium. 

10.  Pay  good  salaries  and  wages,  but  not  exces- 
sive, inflated  ones.     Let  it  be  known  that  absolutely 
honest  and  careful  work  will  be  required  of  all  re- 
porters, desk  men,  correspondents,  special  writers, 
department  editors,  etc.,  and  that  flippancy,  sensa- 
tionalism,    artificiality,    exaggeration,     affectation, 


188  _  OUR  REVOLUTION 

theatrical  sentimentalism  will  be  frowned  upon  and 
discouraged.  Let  it  be  known  that  the  paper  respects 
the  public,  regards  it  as  capable  of  appreciating 
truth,  accuracy,  dignity,  and  sanity  in  journalism. 
There  are  thousands  of  young  men  and  women  who 
will  work  joyfully  and  enthusiastically  for  such  a 
newspaper.  There  are  thousands  of  capable  and 
progressive  journalists  who  are  ashamed  of  the  style 
and  method  that  are  imposed  upon  them.  Some  have 
the  courage  to  say  so  in  print;  many  say  so  in 
private  conversation. 

There  is  nothing  utopian  about  these  requirements 
or  conditions.  Newspapers  of  the  type  described 
might  never  become  "gold  mines,"  but  no  person  of 
sense  and  experience  can  doubt  for  a  moment  that  in 
time  they  would  become  self-supporting.  The  dis- 
satisfaction and  the  disgust  with  many  of  our  "great 
newspapers"  are  more  widespread  and  profound  than 
one  realizes.  As  a  very  thoughtful  and  active  woman 
of  national  reputation  said  to  the  writer  lately :  "The 
public  is  supposed  to  be  getting  what  it  wants  in 
journalism.  It  is  really  taking  what  it  gets.  Why, 
I  have  to  read  every  day  a  newspaper  I  despise.  I 
have  to  obtain  my  information,  and  often  I  uncon- 
sciously form  opinions,  under  the  direction  and 
manipulation  of  men  I  know  and  do  not  respect  either 
morally  or  intellectually.  But  what  can  I  do  ?  There 
is  no  choice.  The  other  papers  in  my  city  are  even 
worse  in  some  respects  than  the  one  I  take."  Thou- 


A  NEGLECTED  OPPORTUNITY        189 

sands  of  men  and  women  in  every  city  will  heartily 
subscribe  to  these  words.  Thousands  would  heave  a 
sigh  of  relief  if  they  were  assured  of  honest,  inde- 
pendent, and  sincere  treatment  of  the  issues  of  a 
great  campaign. 

Let  me,  however,  anticipate  and  meet  some  objec- 
tions to  the  plan  that  are  certain  to  be  raised. 

The  first  may  be  formulated  as  follows,  "Why,  the 
proposal  involves  syndicated  'journalism.'  What  is 
a  newspaper  without  the  personality  behind  it? 
When  you  read  opinions,  you  wish  to  know  whose 
opinions  they  are.  What  weight  attaches  to  syndi- 
cated policies?  How  can  a  foundation  or  a  board 
of  directors  shape  and  determine  newspaper  poli- 
cies ?'* 

The  answer  is  simple.  How  many  of  our  news- 
papers have  personalities  behind  them?  How  many 
readers  know  these  personalities?  And  what  if  the 
personalities  are  known  unfavorably?  What  if  we 
actually  know  that  greed,  political  ambition,  love  of 
notoriety,  etc.,  inspire  the  opinions  expressed  by  cer- 
tain newspapers  ?  We  may  be  compelled  to  read  these 
organs  in  spite  of  our  knowledge. 

Besides,  if  we  want  opinions,  a  truly  independent 
and  honest  newspaper  will  know  how  to  satisfy  this 
want.  It  will  interview  known  experts  and  authori- 
ties, or  invite  them  to  contribute  careful  articles. 
The  sensible  person  is  not  deceived  by  the  tacit  claims 
of  the  editorial  writer.  Anonymity  covers  much 


190  OUR  REVOLUTION 

ignorance  and  ludicrous  pretension.  If  certain  facts 
require  interpretation,  one  wants  to  know  the  quali- 
fications of  the  ready  interpreters.  The  editorial 
"we"  guarantees  nothing.  It  is  often  a  false  and 
impudent  pretense.  It  often  pretends  to  speak  for 
a  community,  or  class,  or  group,  even  when  it  delib- 
erately misrepresents  that  community,  class,  or 
group.  And  it  certainly  speaks  before  it  has  made 
an  effort  to  sound  public  opinion.  It  cannot  wait — 
that  would  not  be  "enterprise,"  and  a  rival  editor 
would  be  sure  to  rush  in  ahead  of  the  man  who  hesi- 
tates, investigates,  or  waits. 

The  proposed  newspaper  foundation  would  repre- 
sent all  honest  opinions  and  views.  Its  object  would 
be  to  bring  data,  facts,  information,  knowledge,  to 
the  readers,  and  of  course  opinions  are  facts.  The 
existence  of  differences  of  opinion  among  those  who 
are  really  entitled  to  form  and  hold  an  opinion  on  a 
given  question  is  itself  a  fact  of  importance.  He 
who  wants  advocacy,  special  pleading,  partisan 
treatment  of  a  subject,  and  who  would  rather  not 
hear  the  other  side,  is  generally  accommodated.  It 
is  the  reader  who  wants  "the  full  record"  that  is  dis- 
appointed and  neglected. 

Here  is  one  "burning"  illustration  of  this  state- 
ment. The  controversy  over  the  new  submarine  boats 
and  their  "rights"  in  warfare — the  controversy  over 
the  defensive  armament  of  merchantmen  and  the 
rights  of  civilians  and  neutrals  on  such  ships — se- 


A  NEGLECTED  OPPORTUNITY       191 

riously  troubled  many  Americans.  They  wanted  to 
know  what  international  law  had  to  say  on  the  issue. 
They  wanted  to  know  whether  our  national  adminis- 
tration was  fully  justified  in  taking  the  position  it 
finally  took  on  that  question.  Did  any  newspaper 
deem  it  necessary  to  ask  the  leading  professors  of, 
and  authors  on,  international  law  to  prepare  state- 
ments thereon?  The  issue  involved  momentous  and 
tremendous  consequences,  yet  the  most  enterprising 
of  the  newspapers  contented  themselves  with  the  ex- 
pression of  personal  and  valueless  notions,  or  with 
little  scraps  and  fragments  of  expert  opinion.  One 
gathered  the  impression  somehow  that  the  supposed 
authorities  were  not  agreed.  The  anxious  reader  was 
perplexed,  not  enlightened,  by  the  little  that  was 
put  before  him.  Yet  to  have  put  before  him  the  ma- 
ture views  of  the  eight  or  ten  men  in  the  country 
whose  authority  could  not  be  challenged  would  have 
been  a  relatively  simple  matter. 

Another  objection  to  the  plan  may  be  anticipated. 
It  is  this:  that  people  will  look  with  contempt  on 
a  newspaper  that  depends  on  "charity"  or  endow- 
ment for  its  very  existence.  To  this  there  are  two 
answers.  Do  people  look  with  contempt  on  science, 
art,  education,  that  depends  on  private  and  enlight- 
ened beneficence?  Is  dependence  on  a  few  big  ad- 
vertisers, with  all  the  direct  or  indirect  "control"  of 
news  and  policies  such  dependence  notoriously  im- 
plies in  many  cases,  preferable  to  dependence  on 


192  OUR  REVOLUTION 

voluntary,  unselfish  endowment  ?  In  the  second  place, 
the  proof  of  the  pudding  is  in  the  eating.  Contempt 
would  not  long  survive  the  testing  of  a  respectable 
and  fit  newspaper  by  its  "consumers."  Good  writing, 
good  reporting,  good  book  reviews,  good  art  criti- 
cism, good  special  correspondence,  timely  and  able 
articles  on  current  subjects,  honesty  and  indepen- 
dence, fairness  to  all  parties  and  schools  that  are 
entitled  to  consideration — such  qualities  as  these 
would  not  be  long  in  commanding  attention  and  ad- 
miration, in  bringing  enthusiastic  praise  and  sup- 
port. 

We  have  plenty  of  syndicated  trash,  syndicated 
falsehood,  syndicated  malice,  syndicated  vulgarity 
and  sensationalism.  Why  should  not  decency  and 
integrity,  sobriety  and  common-sense  use  the  re- 
sources of  cooperation  and  beneficence?  What  is 
more  important  to  democracy  than  freedom  and 
honesty  of  discussion?  What  is  more  dangerous  and 
pernicious  than  the  pollution  of  the  sources  of  popu- 
lar education? 

This  or  that  multimillionaire  may  be  satisfied  with 
existing  conditions  in  journalism.  But  there  are 
thousands  of  wealthy  men  and  women  who  are  em- 
phatically not  satisfied  and  who  would  cheerfully  con- 
tribute to  an  endowment  fund  of  the  kind  suggested. 
A  newspaper  conference  was  held  a  few  years  ago 
to  discuss  the  evils  and  vices  of  contemporary  com- 


A  NEGLECTED  OPPORTUNITY       193 

mercial  journalism.  Cannot  a  conference  be  called 
to  consider  the  feasibility  of  a  newspaper  founda- 
tion? Is  not  the  matter  worthy  of  the  attention  of 
the  sociologists? 


As  intelligent  observers  are  aware,  the  world  has 
been  witnessing  a  dramatic  "race  between  war  and 
revolution"  in  several  countries.  The  war  is  prac- 
tically over,  but  the  revolution  is  far  from  having 
been  liquidated.  As  the  aftermath  of  the  great  and 
tragic  war  we  have  many  grave  and  complex  prob- 
lems that  may  give  our  statesmen  and  jurists  more 
trouble  than  they  have  apparently  bargained  for. 
The  mere  setting  up  of  small  and  restless  nationali- 
ties in  the  independent  or  "sovereign"  business  of 
government  is  a  holiday  task  beside  the  infinitely 
more  difficult  task  of  insuring  reasonable  harmony 
among  them  and  preventing  them  from  picking  quar- 
rels with  more  powerful  neighbors.  Small,  ambitious 
nations  can  become  big  nuisances.  Federation,  union 
for  large  purposes,  cooperation  in  the  interest  of  ef- 
ficiency and  economy,  with  ample  cultural  autonomy 
for  constituent  units,  would  appear  to  be  the  only 
real  solution  of  the  many  national  and  racial  prob- 
lems that  the  war  has  left  us  as  its  heritage. 

That  the  minds  of  sober  students  and  earnest  in- 
formed thinkers  would  naturally  turn  toward  this 
solution,  can  hardly  be  doubted.  The  lessons  of  his- 

194 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA   195 

tory,  assuredly,  are  too  plain  to  be  misunderstood. 
There  is  no  progress  in  disunion,  disintegration,  mul- 
tiplication of  weak,  insecure  states.  There  are  no  ad- 
vantages to  true  civilization  in  reversion  to  a  dead 
past.  Even  a  League  of  Nations  formed  on  the 
most  liberal  lines  would  afford  no  guaranty  of  peace 
and  security  were  the  newly  liberated  nationalities 
to  remain  severally  independent,  jealous  of  one  an- 
other, walled  in  and  legally  isolated  in  a  commercial 
sense.  As  Immanuel  Kant  pointed  out  long  ago,  a 
true  League  of  Nations  implies,  among  other  things, 
complete  freedom  of  trade  among  the  associated 
nations.  Tariffs,  and  especially  preferential  tariffs, 
are  sources  of  irritation  and  friction,  and  a  multipli- 
cation of  independent  states  necessarily  involves  a 
multiplication  of  tariff  barriers  and  customs  houses. 

These  ideas,  to  repeat,  would  meet  with  little  re- 
sistance from  men  of  vision  and  understanding  if  the 
world  situation  were  not  so  befogged  and  if  confusion 
were  not  made  worse  confounded  by  the  revolutionary 
outbreaks  and  disturbances. 

Peace  has  to  be  made,  not  with  stable  and  duly 
constituted  governments,  but,  in  some  cases  at  least, 
with  fragile,  unrepresentative  pseudo-governmental 
organizations — accidents  of  the  hour,  fruits  of 
anarchy  and  chaos. 

Furthermore,  the  world  finds  itself  in  the  midst  not 
merely  of  political,  but  of  social,  economic  and  intel- 
lectual upheavals.  No  wonder  pessimism  is  said  to 


196  OUR  REVOLUTION 

reign  in  high  circles,  despite  the  rather  sudden  ending 
of  the  war. 

Now,  Russia  was  the  first  of  the  great  powers  to 
stop  fighting,  sue  for  peace  and  embark  upon  a  colos- 
sal "social"  experiment.  Her  internal  troubles  and 
trials  since  the  first  of  the  two  revolutions  of  1917 
have  perplexed  the  Western  world  more  deeply  than 
those  of  any  other  country.  Many  have  frankly 
"given  Russia  up,"  saying  that  her  "psychology"  is 
bizarre  and  utterly  incomprehensible  to  a  non-Slav 
mind.  But  we  have  to  understand  Russia — especially 
we  Americans,  who  are  to  be  called  on  to  aid  her  ma- 
terially and  possibly  give  her  sympathetic  guidance 
as  well. 

In  point  of  fact,  the  several  acts  of  the  Russian 
drama  are  not  very  difficult  to  interpret  in  the  light 
of  Russian  conditions — physical,  political,  moral, 
and  historical.  Science  bids  us  look  for  "simple 
explanations,"  particularly  where  human  conduct  is 
concerned.  This  article  is  an  attempt  to  interpret 
the  Russian  revolution  and  its  sequel  without  bias, 
partisanship  or  passion,  and  incidentally  to  throw 
light  on  the  question  of  our  duty  and  opportunity  in 
Russia. 

1.     The  Overthrow  of  Czarism 

All  Russian  writers  of  note  agree  that  the  revolu- 
tion of  March,  1917,  was  truly  national,  spontaneous 
and  popular.  For  the  first  time  Russians  of  all 


schools  and  factions  found  themselves  "unanimous." 
Autocracy  had  committed  suicide.  The  old  regime 
was  bankrupt,  and  there  were  none  to  defend  it  or 
plead  for  a  new  lease  of  life  for  it.  Even  the  peasant 
millions  who  had  venerated  the  "White  Czar,"  the 
"little  father,"  and  had  long  considered  him  to  be 
their  sincere  if  impotent  protector,  were  reconciled 
to  the  abdication  of  the  House  of  Romanov  and  to 
the  establishment  of  a  republic.  Famine,  cold,  mis- 
ery, staggering  losses  in  the  war — losses  attributed 
not  to  the  ordinary  fortunes  of  war,  but  to  incom- 
petence, corruption,  selfishness,  pettiness,  and  actual 
treachery  in  the  Russian  bureaucracy  and  cabinet — 
had  thoroughly  cured  even  the  illiterate  peasant  of 
his  affection  for  the  autocrat.  The  army  welcomed 
the  revolution.  It  was  weary  of  butchery  and  slaugh- 
ter. Too  often  had  it  had  to  oppose  with  bare  breasts 
and  arms  the  irresistible  advance  of  disciplined, 
perfectly  equipped  and  ably  led  enemy  legions.  The 
army  knew  that  Russia  could  not  continue  to  play 
the  part  that  had  been  assigned  to  her.  She  had 
made  terrific  sacrifices  and  had  reached  the  breaking 
point.  An  agricultural  empire,  with  an  illiterate 
people,  undeveloped  "pigmy"  industries,  a  small  and 
ignorant  middle  class,  inadequate  transportation  fa- 
cilities, empty  arsenals,  how  could  Russia  stay  longer 
in  a  war  that  taxed  to  the  utmost  all  the  technical, 
industrial  and  scientific  resources  of  the  twentieth 
century  ? 


198  OUR  REVOLUTION 

The  revolution,  then,  came  because  Russia  needed 
and  demanded  peace  and  bread.  The  masses  of  the 
people  were  not  interested  in  mere  politics ;  as  has 
well  been  said,  the  Russian  people  do  not  "think 
politically,  but  economically."  The  first  provisional 
government  was  expected  to  grant  the  people  the 
blessings  the  czar  had  been  unable  to  give — peace  and 
bread.  It  was,  however,  unequal  to  the  situation.  It 
lacked  moral  authority.  It  was  too  conservative  and 
moderate  for  the  period.  It  had  not  the  courage  to 
inform  its  foreign  allies  in  positive  terms  that  Rus- 
sia was  practically  out  of  the  war  and  that  the 
renewed  "offensive"  expected  of  her  was  impossible. 

The  first  provisional  government  was  a  government 
of  gentlemen,  of  cultivated  and  westernized  men,  of 
professors,  diplomats  and  administrators.  The 
workmen,  the  soldiers,  the  sailors,  and  the  peasants  in 
the  villages  were  not  in  the  mood  to  listen  to  the  gos- 
pel which  this  government  preached, — the  gospel  of 
patience,  of  moderation,  of  sweet  reasonableness,  of 
loyalty  to  allies,  of  strict  observance  of  covenants 
that  had  been  made  by  the  czar.  They  insisted  on 
immediate  relief  and  reform.  The  provisional  gov- 
ernment undertook  many  admirable  things,  but  it 
could  not  give  the  people  peace  or  bread.  It  begged 
for  time,  and  begged  in  vain.  The  real  power  was  in 
the  hands  of  the  militant,  mercurial  committees  of 
soldiers,  sailors  and  workmen,  and  these  committees 
distrusted  the  provisional  government  and  hampered 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA    199 

it  in  every  direction.  They  soon  made  the  position 
of  the  government  untenable,  and  it  had  to  resign. 
It  had  to  make  way  for  a  more  radical  and  more  rep- 
resentative government. 

2.     The  Kerensky  Cabinets 

After  the  fall  of  the  Lvov  government  the  central 
council  of  soldiers'  and  workmen's  delegates  had  the 
opportunity  to  take  the  reins  of  government  into  its 
own  hands.  It  hesitated  and  declined.  It  professed 
its  readiness  to  support  another  coalition  cabinet  and 
work  with  it  so  far  as  it  might  approve  of  its  poli- 
cies. Kerensky  was  the  logical  choice  for  premier  in 
a  new  cabinet.  He  was  a  socialist,  a  popular  orator, 
a  favorite  with  the  trade  unions,  a  former  agitator 
against  autocracy.  Even  moderates  urged  him  to 
take  the  premiership.  He  was  not  a  man  of  action 
or  of  mental  vigor.  He  was  not  a  statesman  or  an 
administrator.  But  he  had  personal  magnetism,  and 
it  was  hoped  that  he  would  by  persuasive  oratory 
and  tactful  private  negotiations  manage  to  induce 
socialists,  individualist  radicals  and  liberals  to  work 
together  amicably  and  preserve  a  semblance  of  dis- 
cipline and  order  in  the  army  and  in  the  country. 

Kerensky  was  obliged  to  make  many  successive 
changes  in  his  cabinet.  He  sought  to  placate  the 
extremists  without  alienating  the  moderates.  He 
played  the  ungrateful  role — doubly  ungrateful  in 


200  OUR  REVOLUTION 

Russia,  where  compromise  is  treated  as  sin — of  op- 
portunist and  Fabian.  His  chief  duty  was  to  pave 
the  way  for  a  constituent  assembly.  He  and  his  asso- 
ciates did  not  feel  that  they  had  any  legal  or  moral 
right  to  settle  momentous,  knotty  and  serious  ques- 
tions— least  of  all  the  question  of  land  tenure.  They 
knew  the  peasants'  attitude  toward  the  land  ques- 
tion. They  knew  that  immediate  expropriation  of 
landlords  without  compensation  was  a  popular  doc- 
trine, and  that  this  doctrine  was  being  disseminated 
by  a  section  of  the  Social  Democratic  party  of  Rus- 
sia— the  Bolshevikis  (who  have  become  so  notorious 
since).  But  they  would  not  or  could  not  use  force 
against  these  agitators — even  when  some  of  the  latter 
were  openly  accused  of  accepting  enemy  money  and 
carrying  on  propaganda  that  happened  for  the  mo- 
ment to  suit  enemy  purposes.  The  Kerensky  govern- 
ment argued  that  free  speech  and  free  assembly  were 
too  sacred  and  inviolable  to  the  revolution  to  be 
infringed  upon  even  in  a  critical  and  anxious  hour. 
They  were  determined  to  be  consistent  and  logical. 
They  would  not  do  the  cruel  things  which  they  had 
condemned  the  czar  for  doing.  The  agitation  they 
would  not,  and  perhaps  could  not,  check,  the  agita- 
tion of  the  extremists  who  talked  to  the  peasants  and 
soldiers  in  terms  they  could  understand,  finally 
proved  to  be  the  undoing  of  the  Kerensky  govern- 
ment. It  fell  because  it  was  too  conservative  for  the 
left  and  too  radical  for  the  rightist  parties.  It  fell 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA    201 

because  it  was  feeble,  uncertain,  divided  against  it- 
self, and  practically  impotent.  Like  its  predecessor, 
it  had  failed  to  give  the  masses  either  peace  or  bread. 
It  had  failed  to  summon  a  constituent  assembly,  and 
it  had  failed  to  impress  the  Allies  with  the  desirabil- 
ity of  encouraging  the  movement  for  "a  negotiated 
peace,"  of  promoting  inter-belligerent  conferences  of 
radicals,  laborites  and  socialists,  and  formulating 
definite  peace  terms.  Kerensky  was  not  as  frank 
with  the  Allies  as  he  might  have  been,  and  it  is  doubt- 
ful whether  they  ever  fully  understod  the  Russian 
situation  before  the  victory  of  Bolshevism.  On  the 
other  hand  there  is  reason  to  think  that  the  Allies 
resisted  unpleasant  explanations  and  shrank  from 
looking  the  facts  in  the  face  so  far  as  Russia  was 
concerned.  They  thought  that  a  Kornilov,  or  an- 
other stalwart  patriot  and  soldier,  could  suppress 
revolutionary  pacifism  and  reestablish  the  eastern 
front.  They  stressed  Kerensky's  weakness  too  much, 
and  could  not  bring  themselves  to  believe  that  ele- 
mental forces,  beyond  the  control  of  any  "strong 
man,"  had  been  unchained  and  let  loose  in  Russia. 
They  mistook  a  mass  movement  for  an  insignificant 
revolt.  They  indicted  individuals  for  acts  or  omis- 
sions which,  at  the  time  and  in  the  circumstances  that 
existed,  could  not  possibly  have  been  avoided.  Rus- 
sia after  the  revolution  was  out  of  the  war  and  in- 
tended to  stay  out.  Even  the  Cossacks  refused  to 
support  a  pro- Ally,  pro-Patriotic  movement. 


202  OUR  REVOLUTION 

3.     The  Bolshevik  Dictatorship 

Lenin,  Trotzky  and  their  associates — none  of  them 
"workmen" — had  little  difficulty  in  wresting  power 
from  the  Kerensky  government.  They  did  not  lead 
the  masses — rthey  followed  them ;  they  voiced  the  peo- 
ple's insistent  demands  for  peace,  bread  and  land. 
They  had  audacity  and  the  courage  of  their  opinions. 
They  were  Social  Democrats,  followers  of  Karl  Marx, 
and  they  subscribed  to  the  economic  interpretation 
of  history,  or  "historic  materialism."  They  had  no 
respect  for  what  they  called  "bourgeois  shibboleths." 
They  had  no  interest  in  political  ideals  and  cared  lit- 
tle about  mere  forms  of  government.  Religion  and 
morality  meant  nothing  to  them;  the  social  revolu- 
tion would  bring  forth  its  own  religion  and  morality. 
They  believed  in  the  gospel  of  the  Communist  Mani- 
festo, did  not  flinch  from  expropriation  and  confis- 
cation of  property,  and  were  prepared  to  use  any 
means  that  might  prove  to  be  necessary  to  the  reali- 
zation of  their  supreme  end. 

Their  first  duty,  as  they  rightly  enough  conceived 
it,  was  to  end  the  war  and  give  Russia  the  oppor- 
tunity of  turning  to  internal  problems  and  revolu- 
tionary reforms.  They  did  not  prefer  a  separate 
peace;  they  served  what  to  them  seemed  quite  suf- 
ficient notice  on  the  Allies  that  a  general  peace  must 
be  made  forthwith  on  the  basis  of  the  Soviet  formula, 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA   203 

"No  annexations;  no  indemnities;  self-determina- 
tion." They  gave  the  Allies  time,  while  warning  them 
repeatedly  that  Russia  might  be  compelled  to  desert 
them  and  conclude  a  separate  peace. 

They  expected  that  the  German  Socialists  and 
trade  unionists  would  come  to  their  aid  in  the  final 
phase  of  the  peace  negotiations  and  force  the  Berlin 
government  and  the  German  high  command  to  grant 
Russia  fair  and  reasonable  terms.  They  did  much 
to  shape  and  influence  labor  sentiment  in  Germany 
and  Austria-Hungary,  and  they  expected  to  reap  im- 
mediately the  fruits  of  their  bold  and  thrilling  ideas. 
They  thought  they  had  so  thoroughly  prepared  the 
soil  of  Europe  for  revolution  that  even  the  German 
kaiser  and  his  generals  would  not  dare  propose  to 
Russia's  Socialist  government  oppressive  and  humil- 
iating terms. 

When  they  finally  signed  the  Brest-Litovsk  treaty 
they  did  so  because  the  anticipated  help  was  not 
forthcoming  and  because  they  felt  sure  that  revolu- 
tion in  Western  Europe  was  only  delayed.  They 
signed  a  treaty  that,  they  said,  gave  them  a  breath- 
ing spell,  a  chance  to  organize  a  "red"  army,  and  the 
infinitely  more  important  opportunity  of  abolishing 
the  old  economic  order  and  establishing  genuine  so- 
cialism in  what  remained  of  the  Russian  empire. 
They  candidly  said  that  they  could  afford  to  give  up 
Poland,  the  Ukraine,  the  Baltic  provinces,  and  much 


204  OUR  REVOLUTION 

more  besides,  for  an  uncertain  period,  provided  they 
were  left  free  to  make  their  historic  experiment  in 
Marxian  socialism  in  the  interior  of  Great  Russia. 

The  Bolshevik  leaders  called  their  successful  rebel- 
lion against  Kerensky  and  his  coalition  cabinet  "the 
social  revolution."  They  planned  to  expropriate  the 
expropriators,  to  seize  the  land,  the  mines,  the  banks, 
the  factories  and  the  other  capitalistic  establish- 
ments, and  to  transfer  these  to  the  people.  They  did 
not  actually  believe  that  the  peasant  and  proletarian 
masses  were  "conscious  Socialists,"  converts  to 
Marxian  socialism;  but  they  believed  that  the  peo- 
ple's sufferings  and  discontent,  and  the  peasants' 
land  hunger,  would  enable  them  to  take  advantage 
of  the  situation.  They  meant,  in  short,  to  use  the 
irresistible  demand  for  peace  and  bread  as  a  stalking 
horse  for  the  introduction  of  the  type  of  Socialism 
they  had  long  advocated  and  dreamed  of. 

But  what  of  the  middle  classes,  of  the  non-socialist 
parties  and  groups,  of  the  milder  socialists  who  were 
opposed  to  confiscation,  terror,  and  repudiation  of 
national  debts?  Would  these  surrender,  or  fight 
Bolshevism  ? 

The  answer  was — the  dictatorship  of  the  pro- 
letariat. Lenin  and  Trotzky  declared  that  all  the 
counter-revolutionaries,  whether  noble,  bourgeois  or 
former  foes  of  the  czar  and  his  regime,  would  be 
ruthlessly  suppressed.  The  rule  of  the  people  was 
the  goal  in  view;  but  the  rule  of  the  urban  pro- 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA    205 

letariat,  led  by  a  few  Marxian  socialist  intellectuals, 
was  the  indispensable  preliminary  stage.  History 
justified  the  dictatorship,  they  claimed.  Revolutions 
cannot  be  peaceful  or  beatific.  Sentimentalists,  rhe- 
toricians, academics,  fair-weather  radicals  were  as 
dangerous  to  them  as  the  reactionary  Bourbons.  All 
enemies  must  be  crushed.  There  could  be  no  com- 
promise with  weak-kneed  reformers.  Past  services 
and  claims  must  be  treated  as  negligible  factors.  The 
success  of  the  social  revolution  must  not  be  jeop- 
ardized by  ideology  or  weak  concessions  to  "bour- 
geois virtues."  Russia  was  the  pioneer,  the  path- 
finder, and  at  any  cost  must  achieve  the  great  ob- 
jective. The  other  nations  would  follow  in  her  foot- 
steps. Russia  was  not  perhaps  quite  ready  for  so- 
cialism, but  there  are  such  things  as  "leaps"  in  the 
history  of  human  progress.  The  minority  was  ready 
for  the  leap,  and  once  made,  there  could  be  no  turn- 
ing back.  The  majority  would  subsequently  be  edu- 
cated and  converted. 

The  group  of  masterful  men  that  held  these  beliefs 
assumed  power  with  the  support  of  armed  guards, 
embattled  urban  workmen,  and  hosts  of  disinherited 
and  vindictive  peasants  who  had  not  forgotten  the 
cruelties  of  the  ancien  regime,  the  burdens  of  the 
czar's  tax  system,  the  exactions  of  the  corrupt  of- 
ficials and  the  tyrannical  agents  of  the  secret  police. 
The  Soviets  throughout  Great  Russia  gravitated 
toward  Bolshevism,  for  it  meant  little,  if  any,  inter- 


206  OUR  REVOLUTION 

ference  with  them  and  immediate  seizure  of  the  land 
that  belonged  to  nobles,  capitalists,  the  church  or  the 
crown.  A  reign  of  terror  ensued.  Every  "bour- 
geois" was  under  suspicion.  How  many  men,  women, 
and  children  the  Bolshevik  regime  has  slain  or  starved 
to  death,  the  world  does  not  yet  know.  But  that 
anarchy  and  civil  war  have  held  sway  throughout 
Russia,  and  that  Bolshevik  troops  have  had  to  fight 
whole  sections  of  the  dismembered  empire,  are  no- 
torious facts. 

4.     The  Bolshevik  Failure — the  Causes 

At  this  writing  the  Bolshevik  government  is  still 
nominally  in  the  saddle,  but  its  collapse  is  foreseen 
and  generally  anticipated.  Even  Lenin  tacitly  ad- 
mits that  his  great  adventure  is  likely  to  end  in 
smoke.  He  has  not  brought  internal  peace  to  Rus- 
sia. He  has  not  restored  normal  conditions.  He 
has  not  averted  famine  and  has  not  started  the  wheels 
of  industry.  The  "leap"  has  not  been  made.  Ukases 
and  decrees  on  paper  are  not  enough  to  carry  a  peo- 
ple over  a  chasm  and  settle  them  securely  under  a 
new  system  of  laws  and  institutions. 

Why  Lenin  and  Trotzky  have  failed,  and  were 
bound  to  fail,  may  be  explained  in  a  few  words.  In 
the  first  place,  they  did  not  give  the  people  the  ex- 
ternal peace  they  had  promised.  The  treaty  of 
Brest-Litovsk  angered  many  Russians,  who  continued 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA    207 

to  regard  Germany  as  an  enemy.  Moreover,  it 
brought  them  the  Czecho-Slovak  complications  and, 
eventually,  intervention  by  the  Allies  and  the  United 
States. 

In  the  second  place,  the  Bolshevik  government  did 
not  bring  internal  peace,  concord  and  rehabilitation. 
Province  after  province,  district  and  center  after 
district  and  center  seceded,  repudiated  the  Lenin 
regime.  Some  districts  set  up  other  governments 
and  opened  negotiations  with  the  Allies.  Russian 
exiles  in  Europe  and  America  carried  on  active  prop- 
aganda against  Bolshevism  and  Soviet  rule,  de- 
nouncing them  as  tyrannical  beyond  anything  ever 
attempted  by  the  czar,  utterly  anti-democratic  and 
hopelessly  incompetent  and  "crazy."  In  the  parts  of 
Russia  which  the  Bolshevik  executive  claimed  to  con- 
trol and  govern  every  former  landlord,  including  the 
richer  peasants,  every  former  owner  of  property, 
every  "bourgeois,"  and  nearly  every  non-socialist  in- 
tellectual was  known  to  be  bitterly  anti-Bolshevik  at 
heart.  Thousands  of  trained  men  went  on  a  strike 
and  declined  to  work  under  the  mediocre  or  ignorant 
appointees  of  the  Bolshevik  Soviets.  This  led  to  re- 
prisals, to  "pogroms"  directed  against  the  intellec- 
tuals. Russia  could  not  resume  normal  life  without 
the  energetic  and  earnest  aid  of  every  intelligent  son 
and  daughter.  True,  these  educated  and  trained  men 
and  women  numerically  constitute  an  insignificant 
element  of  the  whole  population;  still,  as  Lenin  has 


208  OUR  REVOLUTION 

admitted,  Russia  cannot  produce,  trade,  exchange, 
transport,  finance  her  industries  and  commerce  with- 
out this  small  element.  If  it  is  striking  against  and 
boycotting  Bolshevist  rule,  that  rule  must  collapse. 

And  what  after  such  a  collapse?  The  answer  of 
anti-Bolshevik  Russians  of  all  schools  and  parties 
is  that  the  Bolshevik  ministry  must  be  replaced  by  a 
truly  national,  representative  government,  and  that  a 
constituent  assembly  should  be"  convoked  without  fur- 
ther delay  to  give  Russia  a  stable  and  genuinely 
democratic  government.  This  is  the  alternative  pro- 
gram. A  constituent  assembly  elected  under  a  sys- 
tem of  universal,  equal  and  secret  suffrage  would  have 
the  authority  to  speak  for  Russia  and  to  act  for 
her.  No  dictator  has  such  authority,  no  matter  how 
benevolent  and  altruistic  and  self-sacrificing  he  may 
be — or  imagine  himself  to  be. 

5.     Is  the  Soviet  System  "Superior"? 

There  are,  however,  men  and  women  in  England 
and  America  who  assert  that  the  Bolsheviki  are  more 
democratic  than  their  opponents;  that  they  have 
evolved  a  higher  form  or  type  of  popular  govern- 
ment ;  that  the  attacks  on  them  betray  narrow,  pro- 
vincial, prejudiced  minds,  and  that,  even  if  they 
fail,  the  future  is  bound  to  vindicate  them.  It  is  as- 
serted that  Europe  and  America  have  crude,  out- 
worn, unjust  systems  of  government,  while  Bolshev- 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA    209 

ism  has  blazed  the  way  to  a  fairer  and  nobler  form. 
Let  us  examine  these  claims.  Let  us  ask  just  on 
what  basis  of  fact  or  principle  they  rest.  What  is 
the  essence  of  the  Soviet  form  of  government? 

Let  Lenin  himself,  the  acknowledged  intellectual 
leader  of  Bolshevism,  answer  this  query.  In  an  elab- 
orate and  powerful  address  which  he  delivered  at 
Moscow  some  months  ago  Lenin  said  on  this  crucial 
point : 

"We  introduced  and  firmly  established  the  Soviet 
republic — a  new  type  of  state — infinitely  higher  and 
more  democratic  than  the  best  of  the  bourgeois-par- 
liamentary republics.  We  established  the  dictator- 
ship of  the  proletariat,  supported  by  the  poorest 
peasantry,  and  have  inaugurated  a  comprehensively 
planned  system  of  socialist  reform." 

These  two  sentences,  if  they  mean  anything,  mean 
that  a  dictatorship  of  the  city  workers  supported  by 
the  poorest  peasants  is  infinitely  higher  and  more 
democratic  than  a  republic  based  on  universal,  equal 
and  secret  suffrage,  on  the  doctrine  of  majority  rule 
arrived  at  by  free  and  tolerant  discussion.  What 
reasonable  radical  can  subscribe  to  this  notion? 

In  the  same  address  Lenin  continues,  more  ex- 
plicitly : 

"The  Socialist  character  of  the  Soviet  democracy 
consists  first  in  this:  that  the  electorate  comprises 
the  toiling  and  exploited  masses;  the  bourgeoisie  is 
excluded.  Secondly  in  this:  that  all  bureaucratic 


210  OUR  REVOLUTION 

formalities  and  limitations  of  elections  are  done  away 
with ;  that  the  masses  themselves  determine  the  order 
and  time  of  elections  and  with  complete  freedom  of 
call.  Thirdly,  that  the  best  possible  mass  organiza- 
tion of  the  vanguard  of  the  toilers — of  the  industrial 
proletariat — is  formed,  enabling  them  to  direct  the 
exploited  masses,  to  attract  them  to  active  partici- 
pation in  political  life,  to  train  them  politically 
through  their  own  experience ;  that  in  this  way  a  be- 
ginning is  made,  for  the  first  time,  to  get  actually 
the  whole  population  to  learn  how  to  manage  and  be- 
gin managing." 

In  other  words,  the  Soviet  form  of  democracy  is 
higher  and  better  because  it  disfranchises  the  middle 
class,  because  it  disfranchises  the  richer  peasant  who 
shares  the  sentiments  of  the  middle  class,  and  be- 
cause it  puts  supreme  control  in  the  hands  of  the 
city  workers.  Further,  the  Soviet  form  is  higher 
and  better  because  it  dispenses  with  all  formalities 
in  elections  and  enables  a  mass  meeting,  or  a  tyran- 
nical chairman  pounding  a  gavel  to  declare  this  or 
that  group  of  persons  elected  to  this  or  that  set  of 
offices.  Secrecy,  uniformity,  precautions  against 
fraud  and  force  in  elections  are  "bourgeois"  fancies, 
and  their  abandonment  insures  more  certain  and  di- 
rect rule  by  the  people ! 

Of  course,  all  this  is  grotesquely  absurd.  Yet 
there  are  self-styled  radicals  and  progressives  who 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA 

extol  the  Soviet  type  of  "democracy"  and  ask  us  to 
copy  it,  or  at  least  devoutly  worship  it  as  an  ideal, 
if  we  are  too  imperfect  to  realize  it. 

The  Soviet  form  of  government  is  neither  demo- 
cratic nor  rational.  It  is  government  by  accidental 
groups,  by  disorderly  assemblies,  by  haphazard  ar- 
rangements. It  is  government  by  usurpers  and  pre- 
tenders who  may  or  may  not  choose  to  obey  a  dic- 
tatorship of  the  so-called  proletariat,  which  in  turn 
is  led  by  a  small  group  of  remorseless  non-proletarian 
dogmatists  and  social  bigots. 

Some  superficial  apologists  for  the  Lenin  regime 
find  some  hidden  beauties  in  the  fact  that  the  Soviet 
government,  whether  local,  provincial  or  central,  is 
a  government  of  people  who  "work  together"  in- 
stead of  a  government  of  people  who  happen  to  live 
in  a  given  area  or  who  think  alike !  Now  there  may 
be  some  advantage  in  basing  representation  on  occu- 
pation, profession,  calling,  instead  of  on  mere  popu- 
lation. But  what  has  this  to  do  with  the  dis- 
franchisement  of  those  who  "work  together"  as  "rich- 
er peasants,"  or  as  "bourgeois,"  or  as  non-socialist 
intellectuals?  And  what  happens  when  those  who 
work  together  disagree  and  think  separately?  In 
point  of  fact,  the  Lenin  form  of  Soviet  govern- 
ment is  a  despotic  government  of  certain  people  who 
think  alike  and  who  disfranchise  and  suppress  all  who 
venture  to  differ  with  them  and  to  have  other  ideas 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

of  social  and  economic  organization.  It  is  not  a 
higher  form  of  democracy,  but  a  lower  form  of 
tyranny. 

Russia  had  such  institutions  as- the  Mir — the  vil- 
lage commune — the  Zemstvo,  and  the  city  electorate 
to  build  on.  The  czar's  suffrage  acts  were  illiberal 
and  undemocratic,  and  the  revolution  extended  and 
popularized  them.  Proportional  representation  was 
adopted  to  protect  minorities.  Local,  provincial  and 
national  institutions  could  have  been  firmly  planted 
on  the  thoroughly  democratized  suffrage,  and  the 
majority  would  have  ruled  within  constitutional  limi- 
tations. The  Bolshevik  faction  destroyed  democ- 
racy, scornfully  rejected  majority  rule,  and  estab- 
lished a  dictatorship  of  a  small  class  in  the  name 
of  "the  social  revolution"  that  was  to  bring  forth  a 
perfect  democracy.  The  experiment  was  as  inde- 
fensible theoretically  as  it  was  futile,  needless  and 
impossible  practically.  In  Russia,  under  a  demo- 
cratic government,  the  workers  and  peasants  would 
have  controlled  any  assembly,  any  parliamentary 
body.  The  land  problem,  the  credit  problem,  the 
problem  of  industrial  control,  would  have  been  solved 
conformably  to  the  wishes  of  the  great  majority — 
workers  and  peasants.  The  minority,  the  bour- 
geoisie and  the  intellectuals  would  have  been  out- 
voted on  every  definite  issue.  But — they  would  have 
had  the  rights  of  freemen — the  right  to  express  opin- 
ions, to  agitate  and  educate,  to  seek  to  influence  and 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTIONARY  DRAMA    213 

win  over  the  majority.  They  would  have  had  their 
day  in  the  court  of  public  opinion.  They  would  have 
had  no  ground  for  complaint.  As  it  is,  they  are  de- 
prived of  all  political  rights,  all  voice  in  government, 
simply  because  they  might  have  proved  too  persua- 
sive, too  eloquent,  too  successful  in  debate.  Their 
"side"  was  not  wanted.  They  could  not  be  permitted 
to  talk  or  to  vote.  The  people  must  follow  the  pro- 
letariat vanguard  and  Lenin.  They  cannot  be  al- 
lowed to  choose.  And  all  this  is  "higher  democ- 
racy" ! 

These  bedlamite  ideas  have  happily  been  assessed 
in  Germany  and  Austria  at  their  true  value.  The 
Social  Democrats  of  Western  Europe  have  fortunate- 
ly little  sympathy  with  Bolshevism  and  have  regarded 
Russia's  recent  experiences  as  warnings  or  deterrent 
examples.  The  principles  of  democracy  and  liberty 
are  rightly  understood  in  the  radical  circles  of  Ger- 
many and  Austria,  and  the  danger  of  Bolshevism 
in  those  countries  was  greatly  exaggerated  after 
the  abdication  of  the  autocrats  and  the  establishment 
of  a  provisional  Socialist  government.  Russia  must 
learn  from  Europe  and  America  what  democracy  is. 
She  is  learning  now.  She  is  not  lost. 


TRUE  DEMOCRACY  AND  PROGRESS 

Some  Thoughts  on  the  Russian  Soviet  System, 

IN  a  recent  issue  of  The  Open  Court  the  present 
writer  challenged  the  claim  of  the  Russian  Bolshevik 
leaders  that  their  "Soviet  system"  embodies  a  higher 
form  of  democracy  than  the  American  or  any  Euro- 
pean form.  He  attacked  the  dictatorship  of  the 
small  quasi-proletarian  clique  that  has  ruled  cen- 
tral Russia  in  the  name  of  the  working  classes  and 
the  poorer  peasants,  and  he  objected  to  the  dis- 
franchisement  of  the  so-called  bourgeois  elements  of 
the  population. 

Several  correspondents  have  taken  issue  with 
him,  on  the  ground,  as  they  contend,  that  these  un- 
democratic and  illiberal  measures  are  temporary 
and  begotten  of  emergency  and  the  danger  of  coun- 
ter-revolution. What  of  the  Soviet  system  itself  in 
its  substantial  and  permanent  features?  he  has  been 
asked.  Is  not  the  Soviet  system  a  notable  and  val- 
uable contribution  to  the  art  of  democratic  govern- 
ment? Has  it  not,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  impressed 
and  fascinated  the  liberal  thinkers  of  Europe  and 
America?  Have  not  even  the  severe  critics  of  Bol- 
shevism admitted,  with  astonishment  or  reluctance, 

214 


that  the  Soviet  system  "works"  in  Russia  and  con- 
tains elements  worthy  of  study  and  emulation? 

Yes,  the  Soviet  system  has  taken  many  Western 
minds  captive.  There  is  undoubtedly  something  in 
it  that  appeals  to  radicals  and  liberals  in  the  West. 
What  is  that  something,  and  how  much  of  it,  if 
anything,  can  Europe  or  America  adopt  with  ad- 
vantage? These  are  legitimate  questions  that  can 
be  discussed  calmly  and  without  prejudice. 

What  is  the  essence  of  the  Soviet  system — or, 
rather,  what  would  be  its  essence  under  normal  con- 
ditions ? 

The  answer  is  that  the  principle  of  the  Soviet  is 
representation  on  a  new  basis.  Under  it  men  vote 
together  because  they  work  together  and  belong  to 
the  same  social  and  economic  group.  In  the  words 
of  an  apologist  and  supporter  of  Bolshevik  Russia: 

"A  soviet  delegate  comes  from  a  group — a  shop 
or  a  union — meeting  regularly.  A  soviet  represen- 
tative is  continuously  in  touch  with  the  people  he 
represents.  The  Soviets  are  elected  largely  by  occu- 
pations. They  are  full  of  miners  who  know  mines ; 
of  machinists  who  know  machines ;  of  peasants  who 
know  the  land;  of  teachers  who  know  children  and 
education.  The  soviet  is  a  center  for  the  transac- 
tion of  business  by  men  who  know  their  business." 

The  same  writer,  by  way  of  contrast,  thus  charac- 
terizes our  American  Congress — and,  of  course,  the 
characterization  would  apply  to  the  British  Com- 


216  OUR  REVOLUTION 

mons,  the  French  parliament,  the  various  diets  or 
assemblies,  or  the  Russian  Duma  as  it  existed  under 
the  Czar: 

"A  congressman  represents  all  sorts  of  people,  ir- 
respective of  their  work,  who  meet  at  the  polls  every 
two  or  four  or  six  years;  there  is  no  other  bond  of 
union  among  them.  Congress  is  full  of  lawyers  and 
politicians  and  office-grabbers.  Congress  is  too 
often  a  talking  machine,  an  arena  for  playing  party 
politics." 

This  is  not  scientific  or  philosophical  language, 
but  the  points  made  are  tolerably  clear.  Are  they 
valid?  Are  the  people  of  a  state  or  nation  likely  to 
be  better  represented,  and  more  faithfully  and  in- 
telligently served,  under  the  soviet  plan  than  under 
the  familiar  and  conventional  plan?  Let  us  see. 

When  voters  elect  an  alderman,  a  state  legislator 
or  a  member  of  Congress,  they  elect  him,  as  a  rule, 
because  he  belongs  to  a  certain  party  and  stands 
on  a  certain  platform.  We  may  and  should  elimin- 
ate national  party  issues  from  local  elections,  but  we 
cannot  make  local  elections  nonpartisan  or  nonpo- 
litical.  Local  issues  simply — and  properly — take 
the  place  of  national  issues,  more  or  less  irrelevant. 
We  vote  as  partisans,  and  we  join  parties  because 
on  the  whole  they  severally  reflect  and  represent  our 
political  and  economic  opinions.  It  must  be  admit- 
ted that  parties  have  an  irritating  way  of  outliving 
their  usefulness  and  their  representative  character, 


TRUE  DEMOCRACY  AND  PROGRESS  217 

but  if  thousands  cling  to  parties  that  are  morally 
dead  and  practically  futile,  whom  but  ourselves  can 
we  blame  for  this  fact?  Tradition,  habit,  inertia, 
prejudice,  thoughtlessness  keep  such  parties  alive, 
rather  than  the  intrigues  and  stratagems  of  pro- 
fessional politicians.  Besides,  when  a  really  vital  is- 
sue emerges,  a  realignment  is  quickly  and  spon- 
taneously effected.  Passions,  convictions,  interests 
outweigh  tradition  and  habit  when  there  is  a  con- 
flict between  these  sets  of  influences. 

In  short,  roughly  and  generally  speaking,  the  fa- 
miliar plan  or  system  is  a  system  of  government  by 
parties,  big  or  small,  and  therefore  by  opinions.  The 
question  how  our  opinions  are  formed — what  part 
class  or  group  interest  plays  in  the  process — need 
not  be  raised  here.  Perhaps  opinion  is  inspired  or 
prompted  by  economic  interests,  but  only  the  shal- 
low and  half-baked  radicals  maintain  that  opinions 
are  of  no  consequence  and  may  be  completely  ig- 
nored. The  fact  is  that  men  fight  for  opinions, 
make  sacrifices  for  opinions,  and  are  often  uncon- 
scious of  any  personal  or  class  interest  back  of  the 
opinion,  not  to  mention  the  by  no  means  excep- 
tional individuals  whose  opinions  manifestly  con- 
flict with  their  pecuniary  interests. 

We  must,  therefore,  consider  and  criticize  the 
familiar  plan  of  nominating  and  electing  represen- 
tatives as  a  plan  designed  to  give  us  government  by 
discussion,  government  by  compromise  and  ad- 


218  OUR  REVOLUTION 

justment,  government  by  opinion.  From  this 
point  of  view,  our  system  is  undoubtedly  full 
of  faults  and  imperfections.  Sometimes  what 
we  call  representative  government  is  not  in  fact 
representative.  Men  elected  to  represent  mixed  and 
heterogeneous  constituencies  are  found  to  represent 
narrow  special  interests,  spoils  cliques,  etc.  Again, 
too  often  the  representatives  are  not  competent  to 
voice  the  opinions  of  their  constituencies  and  not 
industrious  or  capable  enough  to  acquire  such  com- 
petency. Then,  too,  party  platforms  may  be  so  am- 
biguous, indefinite,  and  empty  that  the  men  who 
stand  on  them  can  hardly  be  said  to  have  opinions 
on  the  actual  issues  of  the  period.  Finally,  even  if 
we  suppose  that  the  elected  representative  of  a  ward 
or  district  is  faithful,  intelligent,  and  fit  to  repre- 
sent those  who  voted  for  him,  what  of  the  minority 
in  the  same  district,  which  is  deprived  of  a  voice  in 
the  legislative  body?  Who  represents  that  minor- 
ity? Some  one  from  another  district,  where  those 
who  believe  as  this  minority  does  constitute  a  major- 
ity? This  is  scarcely  satisfactory,  for  localities 
have  special  needs  and  special  conditions,  and  may 
have  special  opinions  even  while  accepting  the  gen- 
eral platform  of  the  party  that  commands  a  major- 
ity of  the  district. 

For  example,  a  Democrat  from  a  Chicago  district 
is  not  an  ideal  representative  of  an  Alabama  Demo- 
cratic constituency,  nor  a  Vermont  Republican  a 


TRUE  DEMOCRACY  AND  PROGRESS  219 

fit  and  desirable  representative  of  an  Oregon  or 
Kansas  Republican  constituency.  When  a  minority 
in  a  district  is  deprived  of  a  voice,  it  practically  is 
governed  and  taxed  without  its  consent. 

These  evils  have  long  since  been  recognized  by 
students  and  rational  reformers,  hence  the  move- 
ment for  minority  representation  and  for  propor- 
tional representation.  That  proportional  represen- 
tation is  steadily  gaining  ground,  everybody  knows. 
Even  some  of  our  new  city  charters  provide  for  such 
representation,  and  on  small  commissions  in  charge 
of  municipal  affairs  we  now  find  not  only  members 
of  the  major  parties,  but  labor  men,  Socialists,  and 
other  radicals. 

The  logical  position  of  the  upholder  of  demo- 
cratic and  representative  government  is  thus  suf- 
ficiently indicated.  He  must  advocate  the  creation 
of  large  election  districts  and  the  election  from  them 
of  representatives  on  the  basis  of  proportional  rep- 
resentation. We  must  demand  that  every  legislative 
body  contain  members  of  each  of  the  important  par- 
ties, schools,  and  social  groups.  A  system  that  in- 
sures this  gives  us  government  of  and  by  opinion. 
If,  in  addition,  the  term  of  office  is  made  short,  the 
method  of  nomination  simple  and  fair,  and  the  elec- 
tion pure  and  honest — that  is,  free  from  fraud — 
then  the  system  is  as  democratic,  as  genuine,  as 
popular  as  we  can  expect  any  system  to  be  under 
present  intellectual  and  moral  conditions.  Indif- 


220  OUR  REVOLUTION 

ferent,  ignorant,  careless  men  cannot  expect  to  be 
loyally  and  properly  served  by  representatives. 
Eternal  vigilance  still  is,  and  always  will  be,  the 
price  of  good,  or  truly  democratic,  government. 
"Educate  your  masters,"  said  an  English  Tory 
statesman  after  a  notable  extension  of  the  suffrage 
system  that  enfranchised  millions  of  workmen,  agri- 
cultural laborers,  and  others.  If  the  "masters"  re- 
main ignorant  or  apathetic,  they  are  masters  only 
in  name.  Those  rule  who  take  the  trouble  to  rule, 
who  work,  watch,  improve  every  opportunity,  and 
assert  themselves  on  all  lawful  occasions. 

Sound  and  true  democracy  cannot  be  created  by 
fiat  or  miracle.  Education  and  slow  political  and 
moral  evolution  are  forces  for  which  there  are  no 
substitutes.  Given  education,  however,  with  ade- 
quate machinery  and  organization,  and  government 
by  discussion  and  the  free  play  of  opinion  can  be 
made  a  reality. 

One  admission  must  here  be  noted  in  all  candor. 
It  is  possible,  and  perhaps  probable,  that  if  Second 
Chambers  are  retained,  they  will  in  an  ever-increas- 
ing measure  be  converted  into  modified  Soviets — 
that  is,  they  will  be  composed  of  representatives  of 
great  industries,  occupations,  professions,  interests. 
There  is  no  reason  why  England,  France,  Italy,  or 
some  American  State  should  not  make  the  experi- 
ment of  a  second  chamber  so  formed  and  consti- 
tuted. That  is,  farmers,  manufacturers,  merchants 


TRUE  DEMOCRACY  AND  PROGRESS 

and  bankers,  carriers,  workmen,  professional  men, 
artists,  and  others  might  form  guilds  or  other  or- 
ganizations and  send  men  from  their  own  respective 
ranks  to  represent  them  in  a  chamber  smaller  than 
the  popular  and  democratic  chamber  elected,  as 
now,  on  the  basis  of  opinion,  party  affiliation  and 
the  like. 

Now  compare  the  Soviet  system  at  its  best  with  a 
thoroughly  reformed  and  modernized  system  of  gov- 
ernment by  opinion. 

At  the  base  of  the  Soviet  pyramid,  we  are  told, 
are  the  voters  of  the  villages,  hamlets,  towns,  and 
cities.  These  voters  meet  in  factories,  in  village 
halls,  railroad  depots,  and  the  like,  and  elect  the 
local  soviet.  The  methods  and  procedure  are,  and 
are  to  remain,  elastic.  The  local  Soviets  elect  the 
delegates  to,  or  members  of,  the  District  Soviets, 
and  these  in  turn  send  delegates  to  the  Provincial 
Soviets.  At  the  top  of  the  pyramid  is  the  Ail-Rus- 
sian Congress  of  Soviets,  a  body  composed  of  dele- 
gates of  the  lower  Soviets.  The  Soviets  delegate  au- 
thority to  executive  committees,  local,  provincial, 
and  national. 

The  admirers  of  this  system  prefer  not  to  discuss, 
the  two  main  criticisms  that  are  made  by  its  op- 
ponents. But  they  must  and  will  be  discussed  by 
candid  persons  who  really  wish  to  study  the  relative 
advantages  or  merits  of  the  rival  plans. 

In  the  first  place,  the  voters  of  the  hamlets,  vil- 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

lages,  towns,  and  cities  do  not  elect  ^either  the  Pro- 
vincial or  the  National  soviet.  Is  this  democratic? 
Is  it  free  from  danger?  The  All-Russian  Congress 
of  Soviets  is  very  remote  indeed  from  the  governed, 
whose  consent  is  supposed  to  be  necessary  to  make 
government  popular  and  democratic.  There  is  no 
guaranty  whatever  that  the  general  and  higher 
Soviets  will  always  represent  all  the  elements,  sorts, 
and  conditions  of  the  people.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
the  higher  Soviets  may  have  as  many  politicians, 
lawyers,  and  non-workers  as  the  American  Congress. 
The  superiority  claimed  for  the  local  soviet  may  be 
real,  for  the  latter  is  composed  of  representatives 
of  all  "legitimate"  occupations,  interests,  and  pro- 
fessions. But  when  delegates  elect  other  delegates, 
and  the  latter  elect  delegates  to  still  another  body, 
the  character  of  the  supreme  body  plainly  depends 
on  all  manner  of  accidental  and  adventitious  influ- 
ences. This  is  not  democracy. 

The  second  criticism  of  the  Soviet  system  is  even 
more  fundamental.  It  is  all  very  well  to  talk  in 
general  terms  about  the  wonderful  results  of  repre- 
sentation of  occupations,  vocations,  interests,  actual 
social  groups  having  common  needs  and  experiences, 
but  is  it  a  fact  that  the  members  of  a  given  group 
or  profession  think  alike?  Will  it  ever  be  a  fact? 
Do  workmen  in  a  steel  mill  agree  on  political  and 
economic  questions?  Are  all  the  employees  of  a  big 
store  of  one  mind  respecting  such  questions?  Is 


TRUE  DEMOCRACY  AND  PROGRESS  223 

there  unanimity  among  all  railroad  workers?  Do 
teachers  see  eye-to-eye  in  the  realm  of  government 
and  social  science? 

These  questions  answer  themselves.  In  any  fac- 
tory we  are  likely  to  find  conservatives,  moderates, 
liberals  and  radicals,  Socialists,  Syndicalists,  an- 
archists, and  what  not.  Men  and  women  who 
work  together  not  only  do  not  think  alike,  but  often 
violently  differ  among  themselves  and  attack  each 
other's  gatherings.  The  bitterness  among  Social- 
ists and  anarchists  is  proverbial,  as  is  the  antagon- 
ism between  ardent  trade  unionists  and  anti-union 
workmen  of  strongly  individualist  proclivities.  Il- 
lustrations need  hardly  be  multiplied  on  this  point. 

Now,  when  in  any  soviet,  workmen  see  them- 
selves, as  they  inevitably  will,  opposed  by  workmen, 
teachers  by  teachers,  physicians  by  physicians, 
clerks  by  clerks,  what  balm  will  they  find  in  the 
thought  that  they  respectively  "work  together"?  A 
foe  is  a  foe,  and  an  opponent  an  opponent,  whether 
he  works  at  the  next  machine,  in  the  next  shop,  or 
in  a  totally  different  vocation. 

Convictions  and  opinions  are  ultimately  the  deter- 
mining factors  in  legislation  and  political  action. 
The  voter,  the  individual,  wants  his  opinion  to  pre- 
vail, or  at  least  to  have  a  fair  chance.  He  wants 
his  "side"  to  have  its  day  in  court.  A  brother 
worker  who  does  not  agree  with  him  cannot  repre- 
sent him. 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

It  cannot  be  seriously  doubted,  therefore,  that 
eventually  the  Russian  voters  will  insist  on  fair  and 
proper  representation  of  opinions  in  the  Soviets,  lo- 
cal and  general.  This  cannot  be  secured  except  by 
proportional  representation,  and  proportional  rep- 
resentation involves  profound  modifications  in  the 
Soviet  system.  Opportunity  must  be  afforded  to 
those  who  think  alike  to  act  and  vote  together.  If 
workmen,  artists,  teachers,  and  professional  voters 
wish  to  be  represented  by  the  same  set  of  delegates, 
they  cannot  justly  be  deprived  of  that  right.  Farm- 
ers cannot  justly  be  prohibited  from  voting  for 
teachers  to  represent  them,  nor  teachers  from  voting 
for  labor  leaders.  So  far  as  the  mechanical  Soviet 
system  precludes  such  inter-group  voting  it  is  more 
undemocratic  and  objectionable  than  any  feature  in 
the  rival  system. 

Which  system  will  insure  adequate  and  just  rep- 
resentation of  all  social  groups,  all  opinions,  all 
schools  of  thought?  This  is  the  paramount  ques- 
tion. Which  system  will  give  us  orderly  and  pro- 
gressive government?  Which  is  designed  to  make 
democracy  safe,  workable,  rational,  and  sober- 
minded? 

No  reason  has  been  furnished  by  the  admirers  of 
the  Soviet  system  for  scrapping  our  own  imperfect 
system  and  blindly  adopting  their  ill-considered, 
ill-devised  substitute.  We  can  and  should  improve 
our  system  and  certain  useful  hints  toward  improve- 


TRUE  DEMOCRACY  AND  PROGRESS    225 

ment  may  possibly  be  discerned  in  the  Soviet  sys- 
tem. But — nothing  more  than  hints.  The  notion 
that  we  can  change  things,  elements,  qualities  by 
changing  names  is  puerile.  The  notion  that  a  re- 
shuffling of  human  units  will  somehow  rid  us  of  re- 
ligious, economic,  social,  and  other  differences,  the 
differences  that  divide  us  into  parties,  factions,  and 
schools  of  thought,  is  fantastic  and  grotesque. 

To  repeat,  evolution,  not  revolution  or  miracle, 
will  solve  our  problems  and  remove  the  obstacles  to 
human  solidarity  and  human  justice,  national  and 
international,  that  face  us  on  every  side. 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE,  DECLINE,  AND 
FALL 

"PRUSSIANISM  has  been  overthrown,  discredited 
and  destroyed,"  many  liberal-minded  people  have 
been  saying,  but  the  democratic  forces  of  the  world 
are,  or  soon  will  be,  confronted  by  another  formi- 
dable and  dangerous  enemy — Bolshevism.  We  must, 
therefore,  intelligently  begin  preparations  for  the 
next  world  war — war  on  this  new  foe,  war  for  the 
defence  of  democracy  and  civil  liberty. 

It  is  true  that  Bolshevism  is  the  bitter  foe  of  de- 
mocracy and  liberty,  but  it  is  not  true  that  it  is  a 
"new"  foe,  or  that  any  special  preparations  are,  or 
will  be,  necessary  in  order  to  oppose  and  defeat  it. 
Bolshevism  is  merely  one  of  the  forms  of  Prussian- 
ism.  If  Prussianism  is  really  crushed,  then  Bol- 
shevism also  is  crushed,  appearances  to  the  contrary 
notwithstanding.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  Bolshevism 
is  a  foe  to  reckon  with,  then  Prussianism  is  still  alive 
and  full  of  vigor. 

Prussianism  has  not  yet  been  crushed,  but  the 
liberal  and  democratic  forces  in  the  world  have  the 
opportunity  and  the  power  to  destroy  it.  It  is  being 
destroyed,  but  only  as  fast  and  as  surely  as  genuine 

226 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL 

democracy,  liberty  and  justice  are  being  established 
and  made  secure.  Bolshevism  is  being  undermined 
and  destroyed  by  the  same  means  and  the  same 
operations.  We  are  not  called  upon  to  carry  on  two 
wars,  or  to  fight  on  two  fronts ;  the  war  on  Prus- 
sianism  is  also  a  war  on  Bolshevism. 

It  is  the  purpose  of  this  paper  to  justify  the 
foregoing  affirmations.  This  involves  an  inquiry  into 
the  rise,  decline  and  fall — yes,  the  absolutely  certain 
fall — of  Russian  Bolshevism.  Whatever  superficial 
and  ill-informed  parlor  or  other  "reds"  may  say,  or 
think  they  think,  about  Bolshevism,  the  fact  is  that 
it  is  already  an  absolute  failure,  and  that  its  days, 
in  any  scientific,  fundamental  sense,  are  known  to 
be  numbered,  notwithstanding  the  military  and  po- 
litical successes  of  the  Soviet  government.  Incident- 
ally we  shall  distinguish  between  Bolshevism  and 
what  is  loosely  called,  especially  by  hostile  critics, 
"Sovietism,"  which  is  not  synonymous  with  the  for- 
mer term  at  all.  We  shall  distinguish  between  the 
essential  and  the  non-essential  or  accidental  features 
of  Bolshevism,  and  perhaps  remove  certain .  miscon- 
ceptions which  account  for  the  recent  panic  among 
some  American  officials  which  led  to  undiscriminat- 
ing  attacks  on  "radicals"  of  various  types  and  which 
treated  all  Russian  revolutionists  in  this  country  as 
dangerous  "reds." 

The  future  historian  of  revolutionary  movements 
will  have  little  difficulty  in  accounting  for  the  rise 


and  fall  of  Russian  Bolshevism.  The  Bolshevist 
leaders  themselves  have  furnished  ample  material 
whereon  to  base  a  firm,  balanced  judgment.  Bol- 
shevism is  condemned  out  of  its  own  mouth.  It  is 
condemned,  further,  by  the  very  authority  which  it 
has  falsely  claimed  to  follow — that  of  Marx  and  his 
school  of  economics.  It  is  condemned  by  the  teach- 
ings of  living  Socialists  of  reputation  and  ability. 
It  is  condemned  by  the  pre-war  and  pre-revolution- 
ary  writings  of  Mr.  Lenin  himself,  the  schoolmaster 
and  intellectual  leader  of  Bolshevism.  Bolshevism, 
scientifically  speaking,  never  had  a  leg  to  stand  on, 
and  the  thoughtful,  cultivated  Socialists  should  have 
been  among  the  first  to  disavow  it.  Only  amazing 
ignorance  of  Russian  history,  Russian  literature, 
Russian  economic,  social  and  educational  conditions, 
accounts  for  the  foolish  sympathy  which  certain 
American  radicals  and  Socialists  have  expressed  for 
the  insensate  Bolshevik  experiment  in  the  primitive, 
backward,  illiterate,  divided  and  disorganized  Slav 
hinterland  of  western  Europe. 

Nothing  is  more  ludicrous  and  puerile  than  the 
notion  that,  while  Bolshevism  is  impossible  and  un- 
desirable in  England,  Germany,  Belgium,  France 
and  America,  it  may,  nevertheless,  be  "good  for  Rus- 
sia." The  real  student  of  Socialist  or  radical  eco- 
nomics and  philosophy  knows  that  exactly  the  re- 
verse statement  would  be  consonant  with  such  eco- 
nomics and  philosophy.  Bolshevism,  if  possible  at 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL  229 

all,  may  be  deemed  possible  in  highly  developed  indus- 
trial countries,  where  labor  is  organized,  disciplined, 
conscious  of  its  responsibilities  as  well  as  of  its 
opportunities  and  interests,  and  where  the  consoli- 
dation and  concentration  of  industrial  power  has 
proceeded  far  enough  to  'render  "socialization"  of  at 
least  the  basic,  important  industries  a  compara- 
tively simple  matter.  That  Russia,  with  her  pre- 
dominantly rural,  peasant  population,  her  crude  and 
slight  industrial  development,  her  ignorant  urban 
workmen,  her  dependence  on  foreign  brains,  technique 
and  capital,  and  her  small,  ineffective  "intelligencia" 
— that  Russia  could. hope  to  lead  the  West  in  estab- 
lishing Marxian  Socialism,  or  Lenin  Communism,  is 
so  fantastic  and  irrational  an  idea  that  a  few  years 
ago  no  Socialist  organ  or  teacher  of  any  pretension 
to  weight  or  authority  would  have  stopped  even  to 
discuss  it.  It  would  have  been  dismissed  as  an  absurd 
idea  conceived  in  complete  ignorance  of  the  elements 
of  Socialist  economics  and  Socialist  interpretation 
of  social  evolution. 

Let  us  quote  a  few  sentences  from  the  Socialist 
Bible,  Marx's  "Capital" : 

Along  with  the  constantly  diminishing  number 
of  magnates  of  capital,  who  usurp  and  monopolize 
all  the  advantages  of  this  transformation  [the  ap- 
plication of  science  to  industry,  the  socialization  of 
the  form  of  production  through  indirect  co-opera- 
tion, the  internationalization  of  exchange  and  trade, 


230  OUR  REVOLUTION 

etc.]  grows  the  mass  of  misery,  oppression,  slavery 
and  exploitation;  but  with  this  too  grows  the  revolt 
of  the  working  class,  a  class  always  increasing  in 
numbers,  and  disciplined,  united,  organized  by  the 
very  mechanism  of  the  process  of  capitalistic  pro- 
duction itself.  The  monopoly  of  capital  becomes 
a  fetter  upon  the  mode  of  production  which  has 
sprung  up  and  flourished  along  with  and  under  it. 
Centralization  of  the  means  of  production  and  so- 
cialization of  labor  at  last  reach  a  point  where  they 
become  incompatible  with  the  capitalist  integument. 
This  integument  is  burst  asunder.  The  knell  of 
capitalist  private  property  sounds. 

Capitalist  production  begets,  with  the  inexorabil- 
ity of  a  law  of  nature,  its  own  negation. — Vol.  1, 
pp.  836-837. 

Whenever  a  certain  maturity  is  reached,  one  defi- 
nite social  form  is  discarded  and  displaced  by  an- 
other. The  time  for  the  coming  of  this  crisis  is 
announced  by  the  depth  and  breadth  of  the  contra- 
dictions and  antagonisms,  which  separate  the  con- 
ditions of  distribution,  and  with  them  the  definite 
historical  form  of  the  corresponding  conditions  of 
production,  from  the  productive  forces,  their  pro- 
ductivity and  the  development  of  their  agencies.  A 
conflict  then  arises  between  the  material  development 
of  production  and  its  social  form. — Vol.  3,  last  page. 

Here  is  a  quotation  from  the  Manifesto  of  the 
Communist  party,  written  by  Marx  and  F.  Engels : 

The  advance  of  industry,  whose  involuntary  pro- 
moter is  the  bourgeoisie,  replaces  the  isolation  of 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL 

the  laborers,  due  to  competition,  by  their  revolu- 
tionary combination,  due  to  socialism.  .  .  . 

And  here  is  a  quotation  from  "A  Summary  of  the 
Principles  of  Socialism,"  written  by  H.  M.  Hyndman 
and  William  Morris,  and  signed  by  all  the  members 
of  the  Executive  Committee  of  the  Democratic  Fed- 
eration of  Great  Britain: 

We  in  England  have  arrived  at  the  completest 
economic  development.  Our  example,  therefore,  will 
guide  and  encourage  the  world.  .  .  . 

Only  by  collective  superintendence  of  production 
and  exchange,  only  by  the  scientific  organization  of 
labor  at  home  and  supply  of  markets  abroad,  can 
our  present  anarchy  be  put  an  end  to  and  a  better 
system  be  allowed  to  grow  up.  .  .  .  The  very  in- 
crease of  companies,  the  very  development  of  state 
management  now  going  on,  point  out  clearly  the 
lines  of  necessary  progress.  (Italics  mine  in  all 
the  quotations.) 

The  foregoing  quotations,  which,  of  course,  could 
be  multiplied  indefinitely  from  standard  Socialist 
literature,  classical  and  contemporary,  sufficiently 
demonstrate  the  essential  unsoundness  and  folly  of 
Russian  Bolshevism,  which  never  was  anything  else 
than  perverted,  misapplied  Marxian  Socialism  "in 
a  hurry," — Socialism  prematurely  and  ruthlessly 
forced  by  fanatics  and  doctrinaires  on  a  totally  un- 
prepared country,  under  conditions  that,  to  sane 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

minds,  made  any  measure  of  success  utterly  impos- 
sible. 

The  Evolution  of  Bolshevism 

Let  us  next  trace  the  history  of  Russian  Bolshev- 
ism and  attempt  to  account  for  the  tragic  episode. 

It  is,  perhaps,  not  generally  understood  in  the 
West  that  in  Russia,  since  the  era  of  reform  under 
Alexander  II,  practically  every  progressive  or  radi- 
cal, and  certainly  every  revolutionist,  called  himself 
a  Socialist.  Russia  has  had  neither  an  individualist, 
anarchist,  nor  liberal  movement  of  any  importance. 
The  exceptional  personalities — like  Bakounin,  the 
anarchist,  or  Kropotkin,  the  anarchist-communist, 
or  Professor  Gradowsky,  the  liberal — only  empha- 
sized the  prevailing  tendencies  to  which  they  were  in 
opposition.  For  several  decades  in  Russia  to  say, 
"I  am  a  radical"  was  to  say,  "I  am  a  Socialist." 
Why?  To  explain  this  fact,  one  must  have  consid- 
erable knowledge  of  Russian  history.  Suffice  it  to 
say  that  the  Russian  Village  Mir  and  the  Russian 
Artiel  (co-operative  wage  workers'  society)  have 
long  been  regarded  as  institutions  socialistic  in  char- 
acter, institutions  that  readily  lent  themselves  to 
the  changes  necessary  to  convert  them  to  complete 
Socialist  uses.  For  decades  many  Russian  thinkers 
and  revolutionists  maintained  that  their  country 
could  be  spared  many  of  the  bitter  struggles  and 
sanguinary  collisions  which  capitalist  Western 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL  233 

Europe  was  apparently  destined  to  undergo  in  the 
process  of  transition  to  Socialism.  While  Russia 
could  not  exactly  "skip,"  or  fully  avoid,  the  stage 
of  capitalism,  in  the  opinion  of  these  thinkers  she 
could  reasonably  expect  to  shorten  it  considerably, 
to  profit  by  Europe's  experience  and  build  on  her 
own  broad,  national  and  democratic  foundations. 
That  the  whole  civilized  world  was  marching  fast 
toward  Socialism,  the  Russian  radicals  assumed  as 
a  fact  and  never  thought  of  questioning. 

In  the  course  of  political  development  the  Russian 
Socialists  split.  The  Social-Democratic  party  was 
formed,  and  its  tenets  and  methods  diverged  more 
and  more  from  those  of  the  Socialist-Revolutionists. 
The  principal  differences  between  these  two  parties 
were  these: 

The  Socialist-Revolutionists*  platform  was  simple 
— "Land  and  Liberty."  This  meant  land  for  the 
peasants  and  city  workers,  with  or  without  compen- 
sation to  private  owners — though  without  compensa- 
tion to  the  Church  and  the  Crown  for  the  lands 
they  possessed — and  civil,  religious  and  other  lib- 
erty, in  the  Western  sense,  for  the  whole  population 
of  Russia.  The  nationalization  or  socialization  of 
the  land  was  not  to  be  forced,  but  in  every  way  en- 
couraged, the  semi-Socialist  Mir  being  used  and 
developed  gradually  along  Socialistic  lines.  The 
peasant  landowners  were  not  to  be  expropriated  in 
obedience  to  any  dogma,  but  they  were  to  be  edu- 


234  OUR  REVOLUTION 

cated  to  appreciate  the  Mir  and  its  possibilities. 
Concern  for  the  peasants,  indeed,  led  to  the  Social- 
ist-Revolutionists being  called  "Peasantists."  The 
party  made  steady  headway  among  the  rural  popu- 
lation of  Central  Russia  and  by  some  was  incorrectly 
described  as  a  peasant  party.  Constitutional  liberty 
was  highly  prized  and  always  emphasized  by  this 
party  as  the  condition  precedent  to  any  other  solid, 
lasting  reform.  It  was  willing  to  use  terror  as  a 
means  of  forcing  the  blind,  reactionary  autocracy 
and  bureaucracy  to  grant  a  constitution  with  all  the 
basic  political  rights  and  immunities  that  implied. 
Liberty,  or  free  institutions  generally,  were,  however, 
to  be  utilized  as  the  means  of  establishing  socialism 
in  industry  by  legislation,  education  and  all  other 
constitutional  methods. 

The  Social-Democrats  called  themselves  scientific 
and  practical.  They  claimed  to  be  the  true  disciples 
of  Marx.  They  made  their  appeal  to  the  city  pro- 
letariat, as  well  as  to  the  poorest  elements  of  the 
peasantry  who  had  so  little  land  that  they  were 
forced  to  eke  out  a  living  by  seeking  employment 
in  factories  during  the  winter  season.  The  richer 
peasants,  the  professional  classes  and  the  intellec- 
tuals were  severally  regarded  by  the  Social-Demo- 
crats as  enemies  of  the  social  revolution. 

The  idea  that  Russia,  by  reason  of  her  Mir,  her 
Artiel,  her  semi-socialist  traditions,  could  hope 
largely  to  escape  the  capitalist  phase  of  evolution, 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL  235 

or  to  shorten  it,  was  definitely  abandoned  by  the  So- 
cial-Democrats as  Utopian,  sentimental  and  non-evo- 
lutional. Lenin,  the  leader  of  the  Social-Democrats, 
vigorously  assailed  this  old  notion  and  insisted  that 
capitalism  was  the  necessary  preliminary  to  Social- 
ism in  Russia,  as  elsewhere,  and  that  the  part  of  wis- 
dom for  the  true  Socialist  was  to  co-operate  with 
evolution  by  accelerating  the  trend  toward  capital- 
ism. The  Russian  Mir,  with  the  communal  owner- 
ship of  land,  was,  according  to  Lenin,  a  nuisance,  an 
obstacle  to  progress.  Let  the  tendencies  to  peasant 
proprietorship,  as  well  as  to  big  landed  estates,  be 
encouraged  rather  than  resisted.  Capitalism  con- 
tains the  seed  of  its  own  destruction,  and  the  en- 
lightened, "objective"  Socialist  has  no  quarrel  with 
capitalism  per  se,  so  long  as  it  unconsciously  paves 
the  way  to  Socialism  by  creating,  educating  and  or- 
ganizing the  proletariat,  as  well  as  by  consolidating 
industry  and  making  it  ripe  for  ultimate  socializa- 
tion on  Marxian  lines. 

For  a  decade  or  more  the  Social-Democratic 
party  fought  the  Socialist-Revolutionists  vigorously 
on  these  issues.  But  during  this  period  differences 
of  opinion  developed  within  the  £'*ocial-Democratic 
party  itself.  These  differences  finally  caused  a  split. 
The  majority  faction  called  itself  Bolsheviki — this 
being  Russian  for  "the  majority" — and  the  minority 
faction  became  known  as  Mensheviki — again,  this 
being  Russian  for  "the  minority  element."  The 


236  OUR  REVOLUTION 

principal  issue  between  these  two  wings  of  the  same 
party  related  to  the  treatment  of  the  richer  peasant 
and  the  "intellectuals."  The  Mensheviki  had,  and 
have  now,  more  in  common  with  the  Socialist-Revolu- 
tionists than  with  the  Bolsheviki. 

While  the  autocratic  regime,  but  slightly  tempered 
by  the  reforms  of  the  disturbed  period  that  followed 
the  crushing  defeat  of  Russia's  military  and  naval 
forces  in  the  war  with  Japan,  continued  to  suppress 
and  stifle  free  discussion  of  Russia's  needs  and  prob- 
lems, the  indicated  differences  of  radical  opinion 
could  not  be  explained  to  the  uneducated  Russians 
in  popular  language.  Scientific  works  for  and 
against  Marxian,  or  Bolshevik,  economics  were  pro- 
duced, published  and  read  even  in  Russia;  but  they 
were  intended  for  a  very  small  minority.  It  was  a 
criminal  offence  even  to  belong  to  the  Social-Demo- 
cratic or  the  Socialist-Revolutionist  party,  and  the 
adherents  of  either  of  these  parties  that  managed  to 
get  themselves  elected  to  the  Duma  enjoyed  few  and 
limited  opportunities  of  expounding  their  views. 
Many  of  them  were  arrested  and  tried  for  treason. 
Their  addresses  in  the  Duma  could  not  be  printed 
in  any  newspaper  outside  of  Petrograd — and  the  ad- 
dresses could  not  always  appear  in  the  newspapers 
of  the  capital,  the  very  seat  of  the  Duma. 

The  world  war  came,  the  autocracy  and  bureau- 
cracy of  Russia  once  more  revealed  their  miserable 
inefficiency  and  their  corruption  and  infamy.  The 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL 

revolution  of  1917  was  inevitable.  It  was  not  the 
result  of  underground  plots  or  activities.  It  was  a 
mass  movement.  The  peasants  were  as  ready  for  it 
as  were  the  city  workers.  Autocracy  was  hopelessly 
discredited.  If  any  of  the  conservative  or  moderate 
or  liberal  statesmen,  or  members  of  the  Duma,  in- 
dulged, at  the  time  of  the  "political"  revolution  of 
March,  1917,  the  hope  of  saving  the  Autocracy,  or 
the  economic  system  on  which  it  in  part  rested,  they 
were  gravely  mistaken,  strangely  blind.  Under  no 
circumstances  would  it  have  been  possible  by  any 
combination  of  groups,  or  by  any  stratagems,  to 
prevent  the  political  revolution  from  gradually  as- 
suming the  character  and  complexion  of  a  social 
revolution.  All  apologies  for  the  blunders  and  ex- 
cesses of  Bolshevism  that  are  based  on  the  distinction 
between  the  "political  revolution"  that  the  bour- 
geoisie and  the  intellectuals  contemplated  and  fa- 
vored, and  the  social  revolution  that  the  interests  of 
the  peasants  and  wage  workers  demanded,  and  which 
the  Bolsheviki  alone,  forsooth,  were  determined  to 
bring  about,  are  simply  untrue  and  unsound.  They 
may  deceive  the  ignorant  foreign  radicals  who  "are 
not  Bolshevik,  but" — they  have  not  deceived  intelli- 
gent Russians  or  foreign  students  of  Russian  history 
and  Russian  conditions. 

To  quote  at  this  point  from  a  letter  of  Prince  P. 
Kropotkin,  the  Russian  savant  and  revolutionist,  to 
George  Brandes : 


238  OUR  REVOLUTION 

.  .  .  You  know  how  criminal  toward  all  social 
progress  in  Europe  was,  in  my  opinion,  the  attitude 
of  those  who  worked  to  disorganize  the  Russian 
power  of  resistance — which  prolonged  the  war  by 
a  year,  gave  us  a  German  invasion  under  cover  of 
a  treaty,  and  cost  seas  of  blood  to  prevent  victo- 
rious Germany  from  crushing  Europe  under  its  im- 
perial boot. 

If  Kropotkin  had  thought  that  the  revolution  of 
March,  1917,  would  remain  merely  political — that  is, 
superficial  and  limited  to  forms  of  government  and 
slight  attempts  at  ameliorating  the  lot  of  the  masses 
— he  would,  not  condemn  the  Bolshevik  attitude 
toward  the  Allies  and  the  war  as  "criminal  toward 
all  social  progress."  It  was  in  truth  criminal  be- 
cause it  retarded  social  progress  instead  of  acceler- 
ating it. 

But  to  resume  the  narrative.  The  first  revolution- 
ary or  provisional  government  of  Russia  was  not 
sufficiently  radical  or  representative.  It  did  not  last 
and  could  not  have  lasted.  The  Lvov  cabinet,  al- 
though it  planned  and  even  undertook  many  impor- 
tant reforms,  did  not  command  the  confidence  of  the 
militant  radical  elements  or  of  the  suspicious  and 
expectant  peasantry  whose  one  thought  was — Land 
at  last.  This  fact  necessitated  the  reorganization 
of  the  ministry  and  the  appointment  of  a  Socialist, 
Kerensky,  as  premier.  The  Kerensky  cabinet  was  not 
strong  in  personnel,  but  it  was  sufficiently  radical 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL  239 

and  representative.  The  Bolshevik  indictments  of 
it,  when  closely  examined  by  persons  entitled  to  ex- 
press opinions  on  the  subjects,  lack  substance  or 
foundation  of  fact.  The  Kerensky  cabinet  would 
have  wrestled  earnestly  with  the  land  problem,  the 
factory  problem  and  the  other  economic  problems 
of  Russia.  Weak  ministers  would  have  made  way 
for  bold  and  courageous  ones.  But  the  alliance 
with  the  Entente  would  have  been  continued,  and 
Russia  would  have  stayed  in  the  war,  doing  little, 
perhaps,  in  the  field,  but  furnishing  invaluable  moral 
support  to  the  Allied  cause  and  helping  to  undermine 
Prussianism. 

The  Bolshevik  campaign  against  the  Kerensky 
government  was  a  campaign  of  doctrinaires  and  fa- 
natics, of  self-styled  internationalists,  ruthless  ene- 
mies of  capitalism,  of  "bourgeois"  policies  and  half- 
way measures.  The  Bolshevik  leaders  believed  that 
the  great  social  revolution,  that  was  to  overthrow  all 
bourgeois  and  capitalistic  systems,  including  what 
they  called  the^sham  democracy  of  America,  was  at 
hand,  and  that  it  was  their  bounden  duty  and  un- 
precedented privilege  to  give  the  old  order  the  coup 
de  grace  and  usher  in  the  Marxian  Socialist  system. 
What  they  themselves  had  said  and  written  concern- 
ing Russia's  backwardness  and  unpreparedness  for 
Socialism  was  forgotten  or  dismissed  as  irrelevant 
and  inapplicable  to  the  unforeseen  situation.  Russia, 
the  Bolshevik  leaders  thought,  happened  to  find  her- 


240  OUR  REVOLUTION 

self  at  the  head  of  an  international  procession. 
Leadership  had  been  thrust  upon  her;  she  was  not 
to  remain  long  in  a  dangerous,  though  splendid,  iso- 
lation. The  revolution  would  spread  with  amazing 
rapidity.  Italy,  France,  Germany,  Austria,  Hun- 
gary were  on  the  eve  of  tremendous  upheavals.  The 
prospects  were  glorious ;  to  hesitate,  then,  would  be 
criminal. 

Only  as  regards  Britain  and  the  United  States  did 
the  Bolshevik  doctrinaires  admit  some  anxious 
doubts.  Lenin  himself,  the  schoolmaster  of  Bolshev- 
ism, was  frank  enough  to  recognize  the  strength  and 
stability  of  capitalism  in  these  two  countries.  They 
might  resist  the  inevitable  for  some  time  and  cause 
certain  complications.  But,  of  course,  Russia  would 
not  be  the  only  victim  of  such  complications.  At 
any  rate,  the  anticipated  resistance  of  England  and 
America,  the  last  strongholds  of  capitalism  and  plu- 
tocracy, should  not  deter  Russia  from  crossing  the 
Rubicon  and  sounding  the  trumpet  to  rally  those  na- 
tions that  were  ready  for  the  final  contest  with  the 
bankrupt  social  order ! 

We  know  what  the  course  of  developments  has 
been.  Hungary — or,  rather,  Budapest  and  its  im- 
mediate hinterland — tried  Bolshevism  for  a  short 
time.  A  triple  crisis,  and  particularly  the  fierce 
opposition  of  the  peasant  population  and  the  middle 
classes,  put  an  end  to  that  experiment.  Germany 
and  Austria  had  short-lived  revolutions,  but  Bolshev- 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL 

ism  hardly  ventured  to  show  its  head  in  either  coun- 
try. Lenin  and  his  associates  now  frankly  admit 
that  the  social  revolution  in  western  Europe  has 
somehow  been  checked  and  postponed.  The  German 
Social-Democrats,  instead  of  holding  out  hope  and 
encouragement  to  Bolshevism,  are  disavowing  even 
the  purpose  of  undertaking  limited  experiments  in 
Marxian  Socialism.  All  they  are  contemplating  is 
the  enforcement  of  some  legislation  giving  the  wage- 
workers  a  voice  in  the  management  of  industry.  The 
fear  of  militarist  and  monarchical  reaction  is  pro- 
found and  widespread  in  Germany.  The  republican 
and  democratic  regime  is  frail  and  insecure.  Ad- 
vanced as  German  industry  is,  the  German  workmen, 
organized  and  unorganized,  are  not  ready  to  take 
over  the  industries  and  manage  them  efficiently.  The 
middle  class  has  not  disappeared,  nor  has  it  been  re- 
duced to  negligible  proportions.  To  attempt  too 
much,  under  the  circumstances  facing  the  Socialist 
minority,  is  to  court  complete  failure  and  trium- 
phant counter-revolution. 

Even  in  Italy,  where  for  many  months  the  unrest 
in  the  army  and  the  disaffection  among  the  wage 
workers  appeared  to  threaten  revolution,  the  isym- 
pathy  with  Bolshevism  is  purely  platonic.  The  Ital- 
ian Socialists,  judging  by  the  tactics  and  attitude  of 
the  156  Socialist  deputies  in  the  national  parliament, 
are  aware  that  the  country  will  not  support  extreme 
measures.  The  Catholics,  the  liberals,  the  independ- 


OUR  REVOLUTION 

ents  and  the  minor  groups,  though  weak  when  di- 
vided, would,  if  driven  to  unite  by  the  menace  of  ex- 
propriation and  communism,  find  sufficient  strength 
to  make  a  successful  defence  of  private  property 
and  civil  liberty.  The  solid  Socialist  delegation  in 
the  Italian  parliament  is  not  pressing  any  radical 
measures,  being  content  to  await  the  logic  of  events, 
meantime  accepting  small  concessions  from  the  bour- 
geois and  nationalist  government. 

Since,  then,  there  is  to  be  no  'world  social  revo- 
lution in  the  immediate  or  near  future,  and  since  the 
Lenin-Trotzky  summons  is  to  fall  on  deaf  ears,  what 
are  the  prospects  of  Bolshevism  in  Russia  ? 

Let  one  of  the  Bolshevik  leaders,  Max  Litvinoff, 
who  has  been  negotiating  with  the  small  Baltic  states 
as  well  as  with  diplomatic  agents  of  England  and 
Scandinavian  governments,  answer  this  crucial  ques- 
tion. In  a  statement  published  by  him  at  Stockholm, 
Litvinoff  said: 

At  present  we  are  compelled  to  take  a  temporary 
transitory  middle  course  between  capitalism  and 
communism.  Full  communism  is  possible  only  if 
other  countries  accept  the  same  economic  basis. 
Tliey  will  either  follow  our  example,  or  if  Russia  is 
before  her  time  she  will  have  to  revert  to  capitalism 

The  Bolshevik  leaders  know  full  well  now  that 
"Russia  is  before  her  time"  and  that  "she  will  have 
to  revert  to  capitalism."  There  is  not  a  single  in- 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL 

telligent,  sober-minded  observer  who,  after  a  study 
of  the  economic,  social  and  moral  conditions  in  Rus- 
sia, has  not  reached  this  conclusion.  Thus  the  able 
correspondent  of  the  Manchester  Guardian,  a  faith- 
ful and  consistent  organ  of  genuine  English  liberal- 
ism, wrote  recently  in  summing  up  his  personal  im- 
pressions of  Russia :  "The  Bolsheviks  set  out  to  es- 
tablish communism ;  in  this  they  have  failed.  "  They 
have  failed  utterly  in  the  villages,  for  the  peasants 
would  fight  like  tigers  against  state  ownership  and 
control  of  the  land.  The  Bolshevik  land  policy  col- 
lapsed at  the  first  touch  of  reality,  of  peasant  psy- 
chology. Land  is  private  property  in  Russia,  and 
will  remain  such  for  decades,  at  least.  To  what  ex- 
tent the  Bolshevik  doctrines  have  already  been  modi- 
fied in  the  banks,  factories,  mines  and  stores  which 
were  confiscated  after  the  coup  of  November,  1917, 
the  outside  world  is  not  fully  informed.  But  that 
compromises  and  concessions  have  been  made  to  the 
bourgeois  intellectuals,  to  the  unregenerate  captains 
of  industry  whose  services  were  indispensable,  is  de- 
nied by  no  one.  That  more  concessions  are  expected, 
and  indeed  promised,  is  also  generally  known. 

Russia's  natural  resources  have  scarcely  been 
touched,  and  she  has  no  capital  with  which  to  de- 
velop them.  American  and  British  capital  is  openly 
sought  by  Bolshevik  chiefs,  and  all  manner  of  fran- 
chises and  grants  are  as  openly  promised.  Foreign 
capitalists  and  entrepreneurs  are  to  be  allowed  to 


244  OUR  REVOLUTION 

carry  on  business  in  the  "capitalistic"  way — to  issue 
securities,  pay  interest  and  dividends,  and  hire 
workers  in  the  open  market,  subject  only  to  such 
restrictions  as  national  labor  laws  may  impose. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  labor  the  point  that  the 
bids  now  being  made  for  a  reasonable  peace  with 
capitalistic  countries  and  for  loans  and  credits  by 
capitalistic  syndicates  involve  the  recognition  of  the 
impossibility  of  adhering  to  communism — or  to 
Marxian  Socialism  modified  by  the  Slav  tempera- 
ment. The  Bolshevik  leaders  know  that  they  have 
failed,  and  that  their  "social  revolution"  was  as  pre- 
mature as  it  was  disastrous  to  Russia. 

In  the  letter  of  Prince  Kropotkin  already  quoted 
from,  there  occurs  this  sentence:  "The  Bolsheviki 
strive  to  introduce  by  the  dictatorship  of  a  fraction 
of  the  Social-Democratic  party  the  socialization  of 
the  soil,  of  industry  and  of  commerce.  Unhappily, 
the  method  by  which  they  seek  to  impose  in  a  strongly 
centralized  state  a  communism  resembling  that  of 
Babeuf — thereby  paralyzing  the  constructive  work 
of  the  people — that  method  makes  success  absolutely 
impossible,  and  is  paving  the  way  to  a  furious  and 
vicious  reaction." 

This  is  what  thousands  of  Russian  intellectuals,  in- 
cluding Socialists  of  several  schools,  have  been  saying 
for  two  years  past.  This  is  what  the  informed  and 
mature  European  and  American  radicals  have  been 
saying.  The  misdirected,  hysterical  sympathy  of 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL  245 

certain  American  self-styled  radicals  and  democrats 
for  Bolshevism  is  a  puzzling  phenomenon.  It  argues 
inability  to  think  and  to  understand.  It  argues  pro- 
found ignorance  of  the  elements  of  revolutionary 
philosophy  and  also  a  certain  insincerity  and  intel- 
lectual dishonesty. 

Bolshevism  is  Prussianism,  and  it  must  fail  exactly 
as  Prussianism  failed,  and  for  the  same  reason.  Its 
method  was  fatal,  its  philosophy  anti-democratic, 
anti-humanitarian,  illiberal. 

The  future  of  civilization  does  not  depend  on  any 
"ism,"  and  the  ruthless  attempt  of  a  handful  of  doc- 
trinaires to  impose  Marxian  Socialism  on  Russia 
was  particularly  fatuous.  But  there  can  be  little 
doubt  of  the  fact  that  the  world-wide  Socialist  move- 
ment, which  has  undergone  many  changes  and  is 
likely  to  undergo  further  changes,  will  furnish  many 
hints  and  ideas  to  the  solution  of  our  social-economic 
problems.  There  is  but  little  doubt  that  capitalism 
will  ultimately  be  superseded  and  replaced  by  a  co- 
operative system  of  production  and  distribution,  and 
that  the  wage  relation  will  be  replaced  by  a  relation 
of  copartnership — a  relation  that  reduces  friction  to 
a  minimum  and  stimulates  effort  for  the  common 
good.  If  the  civilized  and  advanced  countries  ex- 
hibit a  disposition  to  adopt  co-operation,  or  what 
may  perhaps  be  called  voluntary  Socialism,  Russia, 
with  her  Mir  and  Artiel,  may  confidently  be  expected 
to  make  rapid  progress  in  that  same  direction.  The 


246  OUR  REVOLUTION 

Bolshevik  error  was  in  supposing  that  Russia,  under 
the  lash  of  a  dictatorship  for  the  proletariat  but 
not  of  it,  could  be  forced  to  swallow  Marxian  Social- 
ism, successfully  operate  its  machinery  and  institu- 
tions and  thus  give  the  world  a  convincing  object 
lesson. 

Russia  will  revert  to  capitalism,  but  only  to  renew 
her  slow,  gradual,  evolutional  advance  toward  co- 
operative industry.  She  will  march  with,  if  some- 
what behind,  western  Europe  and  America,  but  not 
necessarily  very  far  behind.  Those  of  her  thinkers 
were  right  who  have  maintained  that  she  might 
shorten  the  process  of  transformation  by  utilizing 
her  peculiar  institutions,  on  the  one  hand,  and,  on 
the  other,  by  studying  the  developments  and  read- 
justments of  more  advanced  nations. 

The  Soviet  System 

But  will  Bolshevism  contrive  to  save  the  so  called 
Soviet  form  of  government,  which  manifestly  has 
no  close  connection  with  communism?  The  interest 
in  and  the  admiration  for  the  Soviet  system  are  not 
unnatural.  The  essence  of  that  system  is  "function- 
al representation,"  or,  as  the  Guild  Socialists  of 
England  would  put  it,  "functional  democracy."  To 
the  Soviets,  local,  provincial  and  central,  men  and 
women  are  sent,  not  because  they  profess  certain 
opinions,  or  because  they  belong  to  certain  parties, 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL  247 

but  because  they  pursue  certain  vocations  or  work 
in  certain  useful  industries.  This  system  is  supposed 
to  yield  a  better  quality  of  representation,  to  keep 
mere  politicians,  windbags  and  trimmers  out  of  pub- 
lic life,  and  to  make  the  legislative  bodies  respon- 
sible, efficient,  dignified  and  independent. 

We  know  that  the  question  of  improving  repre- 
sentative government — which  at  times  has  broken 
down  even  with  us  Americans — has  been  under  dis- 
cussion for  decades ;  that  functional  representation 
is  not  a  Bolshevik  idea ;  that  Anglo-Saxon  writers 
have  suggested  again  and  again  that  at  least  one  of 
the  legislative  chambers — the  Senate,  with  us,  for 
example — should  be  composed  of  direct  representa- 
tives of  industries,  trades,  professions  and  recog- 
nized interests,  instead  of,  as  now,  of  lawyers  and 
professional  politicians  that  are  supposed  to  repre- 
sent the  population  at  large.  We  know  that  func- 
tional representation  has  been  studied  with  sympathy 
along  with  such  other  means  of  improving  govern- 
mental machinery  as  the  referendum,  the  recall,  pro- 
portional representation,  and  the  like. 

There  is  no  reason  why  Rlussia  should  not  lead  the 
West  in  experiments  with  functional  representation. 
True,  she  needs  this  system  less  than  we  do,  for  her 
population  is  industrially  more  homogeneous,  and 
under  any  plan  of  democratic  government  her  peas- 
ants would  dominate  her  provincial  and  national  leg- 
islative bodies.  Still,  this  feature  of  the  Soviet  sys- 


248  OUR  REVOLUTION 

tern  is  not  unsound  and  is  fairly  attractive.  It  is 
certain  to  develop  evils  and  weaknesses  of  its  own 
under  normal  conditions  and  severe  tests,  and  the 
present  writer  is  disposed  to  think  that  proportional 
representation,  plus  the  referendum  and  recall,  is 
preferable  to  the  strict  plan  of  functional  represen- 
tation. This,  however,  is  not  the  place  to  argue  this 
point. 

To  sum  up :  Everything  characteristic  of  Bolshev- 
ism is  wrong,  unscientific  and  impossible.  Bolshev- 
ism is  Prussianism  in  another  form.  It  is  equally 
opposed  to  democracy,  to  liberty,  to  evolution.  It 
is  merely  the  substitution  of  the  tyranny  of  the 
Agnostic  and  Socialist  Lenin  for  that  of  the  monar- 
chist and  orthodox  Nicholas  Romanoff.  Lenin  is 
sincere — so  was  Romanoff. 

The  world  will  not  be  saved  by  benevolent  tyrants 
of  any  school.  It  will  be  saved  by  trial  and  error 
under  forms  of  government  that  permit  the  fullest 
discussion,  the  greatest  freedom  for  social  and  eco- 
nomic adventures,  for  individual  and  minority  depart- 
ures, and  the  amplest  scope  for  experiment  compat- 
ible with  reasonable  stability  of  the  social  structure. 
Revolutions,  so-called,  are  incidents  and  accidents. 
A  momentous  change — the  establishment  of  co-op- 
erative industry — comparable  only  with  the  transi- 
tion from  feudalism  to  capitalism,  is  not  to  be  ef- 
fected by  explosions  of  bad  temper  and  anger,  though 
such  explosions  may  occur.  Just  as  all  ways  led  to 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL    249 

Rome,  so  in  our  time  all  ways  lead,  and  will  for  dec- 
ades and  perhaps  centuries  continue  to  lead,  to  co- 
operative industry  and  industrial  democracy.  A 
hundred  forces  and  factors  will  contribute  to  the 
great  social  revolution.  The  tragic  chapter  written 
by  Bolshevism  into  the  annals  of  modern  society  has 
but  served  to  emphasize  the  futility  and  absurdity 
of  reform  under  a  rigid  formula  by  catastrophic 
and  violent  leaps  at  the  command  of  stern  and  un- 
bending autocrats. 

The  Allies,  including  America,  have  not  known  how 
to  combat  Bolshevism.  They  have  not  understood 
this  singular  phenomenon.  They  have  charged  the 
Bolshevik  leaders  with  pro-Germanism,  and  have 
adopted  measures — the  blockade,  the  "sanity  cor- 
don" of  small,  anti-Bolshevik  principalities,  aid  to 
various  military  dictators  and  counter-revolutionists 
— that,  instead  of  weakening  Bolshevism,  have 
brought  it  strength  and  prolonged  its  life.  Some  of 
the  blunders  of  the  Allied  governments  may  be  expli- 
cable and  even  natural.  But  the  fact  remains  that 
Allied  policy  has  not  had  the  effects  that  were  in- 
tended. Bolshevism  cannot  be  destroyed  by  bayo- 
nets or  by  blockades.  It  can  be  destroyed  only  by 
free  discussion,  by  free  intercourse  with  the  West,  by 
the  release  of  the  industrial  and  moral  forces  within 
Russia  herself  that  are  opposed  to  tyranny  and  vio- 
lence. Russia  is  not  Bolshevik  and  under  normal 
conditions  Bolshevism  would  long  since  have  been 


250  OUR  REVOLUTION 

overthrown  there.  Give  Russia  goods,  capital  and 
vital  contact  with  the  West,  and  the  whole  Bolshevik 
fabric  must  collapse. 

Meantime  the  anti-Bolshevik  movement  in  the 
United  States  is  assuming  the  character  of  a  panic. 
Anti-sedition  laws  of  the  vaguest  and  most  dangerous 
sort  are  demanded;  deportations  of  ignorant  aliens 
whose  foolish  talk  is  unworthy  of  attention  are  mak- 
ing martyrs  and  "refugees"  by  the  hundred.  Free 
speech-  is  menaced,  and  the  post-office  is  being  used 
to  creat  a  peace-time  censorship  of  the  most  stupid 
and  intolerable  kind.  In  short,  Prussian  methods 
are  adopted  or  proposed  in  democratic  America  to 
fight  Prussianism.  Where  is  our  faith  in  liberty, 
in  discussion,  in  common  sense  and,  in  the  virtue  of 
historically  developed  institutions  that  on  the  whole 
fit  our  conditions  and  our  needs  and  that,  despite 
all  crude,  silly  agitation,  will  be  modified  only  so  far 
and  so  fast  as  our  conditions  and  needs  change? 

Democracy  has  but  one  enemy — to  repeat — and  to 
fight  this  enemy  with  anti-democratic  weapons  is  to 
surrender  to  him.  The  most  searching  criticisms  of 
democracy  will  do  it  infinitely  less  harm  than  a  single 
act  of  injustice  toward  its  critics.  The  advocacy  of 
violence  and  crime  cannot  be  permitted  and  the  phys- 
ical-force revolutionists  who  attack  officials  or  in- 
dividual capitalists  may  properly  be  restrained  or 
punished.  But  to  suppress  the  books  or  the  organs 
of  radical  groups  because  they  advocate  commun- 


BOLSHEVISM:  ITS  RISE  AND  FALL  251 

ism,  anarchy,  syndicalism,  cfr  guild  socialism  as  sys- 
tems preferable  to  ours  is  to  evince  distrust  of  gen- 
uine democracy  and  to  violate  its  basic  principles. 

We  want  and  need  the  opinions  of  the  "reds,"  nay 
of  the  reddest  of  the  reds — provided  the  expression 
of  opinions  does  not  degenerate  into  the  direct  en- 
couragement and  propaganda  of  crime. 


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